"My side" bias

As we read or hear about the Supreme Court and discussion of marriage equality, it can be very frustrating to hear the same tired old, disproved arguments crop up again and again. What we may not realize is that the other side is also tired of hearing our side's arguments, which they find as unconvincing as we find theirs. So just a reminder to help maintain calm:

Confirmation bias, also called my side bias, is the tendency to search for, interpret, or recall information in a way that confirms one's beliefs or hypotheses. It is a type of cognitive bias and a systematic error of inductive reasoning. People display this bias when they gather or remember information selectively, or when they interpret it in a biased way. The effect is stronger for emotionally charged issues and for deeply entrenched beliefs. Marriage equality clearly falls into this category.

People also tend to interpret ambiguous evidence as supporting their existing position. You may notice that people on both sides of this issue will report enthusiasm for the clear leanings of a particular justice -- even when opposing sides are clearly convinced that they heard that justice speaking on behalf of their position. Depending on the news source you favor, you may hear completely different evaluations of what is going on.

Biased search, interpretation and memory have been invoked to explain attitude polarization (when a disagreement becomes more extreme even though the different parties are exposed to the same evidence), belief perseverance (when beliefs persist after the evidence for them is shown to be false), the irrational primacy effect (a greater reliance on information encountered early in a series) and illusory correlation (when people falsely perceive an association between two events or situations).

 Click on image to enlarge for reading.

A series of experiments in the 1960s suggested that people are biased toward confirming their existing beliefs. Later work re-interpreted these results as a tendency to test ideas in a one-sided way, focusing on one possibility and ignoring alternatives. In certain situations, this tendency can bias people's conclusions. Explanations for the observed biases include wishful thinking (lots of that going on all over the place) and the limited human capacity to process information. Another explanation is that people show confirmation bias because they are weighing up the costs of being wrong, rather than investigating in a neutral, scientific way.

Confirmation biases contribute to overconfidence in personal beliefs and can maintain or strengthen beliefs in the face of contrary evidence. Poor decisions due to these biases have been found in political and organizational contexts. And, I suspect, in just about everyone's personal experience of themselves and others.

And remember: I may be right and still fall into the trap of not listening carefully to opposing positions, which makes it harder to treat my opponents with respect and dignity or present my own position calmly and clearly. That helps no one. 

I have found it helpful, though by no means easy, to try to first make sure I understand the other side, asking clarifying questions and getting confirmation that I do understand, before trying to advance my ideas. This does not always work, maybe not even much of the time. But I find that I feel more relaxed when I approach things this way.