Availability

Photo by Adrian Smith on Unsplash

More often than not, we tend to judge how a particular situation will turn out based on how easily that outcome comes to mind, which is influenced by what we’ve seen, experienced or heard most recently. 

This is called the Availability heuristic or Availability bias. Per Wikipedia:

The availability heuristic operates on the notion that if something can be recalled, it must be important, or at least more important than alternative solutions which are not as readily recalled. Subsequently, under the availability heuristic, people tend to heavily weigh their judgments toward more recent information, making new opinions biased toward that latest news.

For example, we tend to think we’re more at risk from shark attacks than from falling airplane parts (because we hear more about then former than the latter), but the facts will tell us otherwise. Or when the stock market is crashing, we tend to overstate the dire nature of future market performance irrespective of what actual returns might be. 

All of which is to say that we’re not processing all of the relevant information. We’re not taking into account all of the facts. We’re not doing our homework and thinking rationally. And in the long run this leads to suboptimal decisions, decisions that don’t allow us to do or be our best.

Maybe it’s better for us to take a step back, calm down and look at the facts on the table. The rear view is helpful, but only to an extent.

More important is what the data is actually telling us and what we believe (and want) to make of it.