Because of the framing effect, the way information is presented to us influences how attractive a proposition is.
Suppose you are considering joining a gym. A membership at $500 per year sounds like a considerable investment and might prevent you from signing up immediately. However, if they tell you it costs just $1.37 per day and emphasize that this is less than the cost of a cup of coffee, you might think it’s a great offer, even though in reality both offers cost you the same.
The framing effect is often used in advertising to positively influence consumer choice.
One common type of frame is “gain framing.” This shows consumers how they are going to benefit from a product or service. For example, dental care product advertisements use gain framing to display the benefits of using their product: white teeth, healthy gums, fresh breath, etc.
Apart from the obvious benefits, ads using the framing effect often imply other benefits, such as how a better-looking smile makes one more attractive to potential dating partners.
In survey research, such as political polling, the way questions are worded or the order in which answers are presented can influence how respondents answer the questions. This is called the framing effect.
For example, if voters are asked to select which of two candidates they plan to vote for, the order in which the candidates are listed affects the percentage of respondents selecting each candidate. Recognizing the potential for research bias, researchers typically rotate which major candidate is listed first and which is listed second.
Although both are common types of cognitive bias, they refer to different ways of processing information.
The availability bias (or availability heuristic) refers to the tendency people have to rely on information that is easier to recall when faced with a decision.
Confirmation bias is the tendency to selectively search for or interpret information in a way that confirms one’s preconceived ideas.
In other words, the availability heuristic gives preference to information that is easy to recall, while confirmation bias gives preference to information that aligns with our existing beliefs. Even though they are different, they both cause us to focus on only a subset of information.
Heuristics are mental shortcuts or rules of thumb that help people reduce the time and effort required to make a decision. An example of a heuristic in psychology is the availability heuristic (or availability bias). It involves relying on information that comes to mind quickly, (i.e., information that is available to us).
The availability heuristic can influence our perception of risk in everyday life. One common example occurs when we are considering buying insurance. The sharp increase in purchases of flood insurance in the aftermath of flood events illustrates this phenomenon.
Witnessing such events, knowing someone who was personally affected, or extensive media coverage can make us more aware of floods (or make floods more “available” to us). This can change our risk perception, even though statistically there may not be a change in the probabilities of future flooding.
Belief bias and confirmation bias are both types of cognitive bias that impact our judgment and decision-making.
Confirmation bias relates to how we perceive and judge evidence. We tend to seek out and prefer information that supports our preexisting beliefs, ignoring any information that contradicts those beliefs.
Belief bias describes the tendency to judge an argument based on how plausible the conclusion seems to us, rather than how much evidence is provided to support it during the course of the argument.
The bandwagon effect is a type of cognitive bias. It describes the tendency of people to adopt behaviors or opinions simply because others are doing so, regardless of their own beliefs.
Cognitive bias is an umbrella term used to describe the different ways in which our beliefs and experiences impact our judgment and decision making. These preconceptions are “mental shortcuts” that help us speed up how we process and make sense of new information.
However, this tendency may lead us to misunderstand events, facts, or other people. Cognitive bias can be a source of research bias.
A funnel plot shows the relation between a study’s effect size and its precision. It is a scatter plot of the treatment effects estimated from individual studies (horizontal axis) against sample size (vertical axis).
Asymmetry in the funnel plot, measured using regression analysis, is an indication of publication bias. In the absence of bias, results from small studies will scatter widely at the bottom of the graph, with the spread narrowing among larger studies.
The idea here is that small studies are more likely to remain unpublished if their results are nonsignificant or unfavorable, whereas larger studies get published regardless. This leads to asymmetry in the funnel plot.
