Identifying Bias

We all have bias's. It's a part of how we learn and what determines parts of the vast sea of information we have bombarding us daily we let in to seriously consider. If you wish to read or re-read the information about that the thread is: Denying ignorance and the mind's tendency to reinforce it.
Firstly, we shall look at the dictionary definition for bias.

Main Entry: 1bi·as
Pronunciation: \ˈbī-əs\
Function: noun
Etymology: Middle French biais
Date: 1530
1 : a line diagonal to the grain of a fabric; especially : a line at a 45 degree angle to the selvage often utilized in the cutting of garments for smoother fit
2 a : a peculiarity in the shape of a bowl that causes it to swerve when rolled on the green in lawn bowling b : the tendency of a bowl to swerve; also : the impulse causing this tendency c : the swerve of the bowl

3 a : bent, tendency b : an inclination of temperament or outlook; especially : a personal and sometimes unreasoned judgment : prejudice c : an instance of such prejudice d (1) : deviation of the expected value of a statistical estimate from the quantity it estimates (2) : systematic error introduced into sampling or testing by selecting or encouraging one outcome or answer over others

4 a : a voltage applied to a device (as a transistor control electrode) to establish a reference level for operation b : a high-frequency voltage combined with an audio signal to reduce distortion in tape recording

synonyms see predilection

— on the bias : askew, obliquely

SOURCE:[email protected]
*revelant definition highlighted*

Now, bias, is basically a direction in which the mind bends information to better favor it's preconceptions. Where information that agrees with is accentuated and information that does not is denigrated. Or excuses made for one group that are not made for another. Which of course is a serious stumbling block to any search for knowledge. So I figured I'd post some information about identifying so we can minimise the effect of biased information. Of course this information can also be used to evaluate one's self, but it's harder to see bias in one's self. That being said, enjoy.

Any source can be biased which is why good researchers always question everything they see.

Being able to identify bias helps you understand the underlying message in a piece of text, a painting, a photograph, etc.

You need to be able to identify bias in every resource you use. The following questions will help you to critically assess any resource.

Who created the resource?

Whether the resource is a book, journal article, website or photograph, it will be influenced by the ideas of the person who created it. Think about:

• the creator's age, religion, race and occupation
  For example
  If you and your teacher both had to write an essay about the importance of homework, you would probably give very different answers...
  
• whether the creator is presenting the whole story – you'll need to read widely to get all perspectives
  
• whether the creator is an expert on the topic.

When was the resource created?

A book, painting or newspaper article – in fact, any type of resource you look at – will reflect the society and time in which it was created.
So it's useful to think about the events, people and ideas – or historical context – that surround it. Keep in mind that:

• the less time between the event and the time of writing, the more likely certain details – such as dates, names and locations – will be accurate
  
• older documents show us what life was like in the past, and can also reveal attitudes that may be uncommon or unacceptable today
  
• particular formats – such as diaries, emails, video, sms, etc – reflect the era in which they were created, so think about what the format reveals about the resource
  
• even if the resource is only a few years old, it may not be the most up-to-date information, especially if it is part of an ongoing study or changing theories.
  
  Why was the resource created?
  
  Writers, artists, historians, photographers and other creators will sometimes use their work to persuade people about a particular viewpoint or interpretation of an idea or event. So, it's important to work out why the resource was created. Remember:
  
  
  • the creator's purpose is, more often than not, the message you remember long after you've finished reading or looking at it
    
  • in printed material, look for a range of opinions that are supported by different sources – this helps you make up your own mind about the information being presented
    
  • in secondary sources a bibliography is often a good sign of a reputable resource, but you'll need to check whether the references listed are reliable and credible.
  
  
  Who was the resource created for?
  
  Many different kinds of resources – from maps, government documents and diaries to photographs, websites and advertising materials – are created for many different audiences.
  
  So it's important to think about how the intended audience has affected the format and overall message in the resource. Ask yourself:
  
  
  • Who is the target audience?
    For example
    A teen magazine, travel website or tabloid newspaper has a very different audience to an academic journal, government annual report or a reputable broadsheet newspaper. You would expect the approach to text in each of these publications to be very different.
    
  • Did the creator intend for their work to be looked at by someone else?

SOURCE:www.slv.vic.gov.au...

Here is a sample of a site with teaching tools on identifying bias.

I. Presentation 1: Bias in Science
Description
• Reviews and corrects some common misconceptions about science.
• Introduces concept that science can be done poorly. Bias can be introduced into research through sample selection and measurement techniques and this can lead to inaccurate results.
• Describes methods scientists use to eliminate or at least decrease bias in their investigations.
• Outlines tools students can use to identify potential sources of bias in research.
Goals
• Students understand that science can be done poorly and that good science requires extreme care in developing an experimental design that will minimize bias.
• Students learn how bias can be introduced into scientific experiments and steps the scientific community takes to minimize bias.
• Students learn ways to identify potential bias when presented with scientific information.

SOURCE:www.pwrc.usgs.gov...

To be continued on next post......

Continued from previous post.....

Decision-making and behavioral biases

• Bandwagon effect — the tendency to do (or believe) things because many other people do (or believe) the same. Related to groupthink and herd behaviour.
  
• Base rate fallacy — ignoring available statistical data in favor of particulars.
  
• Bias blind spot — the tendency not to compensate for one's own cognitive biases.
  
• Choice-supportive bias — the tendency to remember one's choices as better than they actually were.
  
• Confirmation bias — the tendency to search for or interpret information in a way that confirms one's preconceptions.
  
• Congruence bias — the tendency to test hypotheses exclusively through direct testing, in contrast to tests of possible alternative hypotheses.
  
• Contrast effect — the enhancement or diminishing of a weight or other measurement when compared with a recently observed contrasting object.
  
• Déformation professionnelle — the tendency to look at things according to the conventions of one's own profession, forgetting any broader point of view.
  
• Denomination effect — the tendency to spend more money when it is denominated in small amounts (e.g. coins) than large amounts (e.g. bills).
  
• Distinction bias — the tendency to view two options as more dissimilar when evaluating them simultaneously than when evaluating them separately.
  
• Endowment effect — "the fact that people often demand much more to give up an object than they would be willing to pay to acquire it".[4]
  
• Experimenter's or Expectation bias — the tendency for experimenters to believe, certify, and publish data that agree with their expectations for the outcome of an experiment, and to disbelieve, discard, or downgrade the corresponding weightings for data that appear to conflict with those expectations.
  
• Extraordinarity bias — the tendency to value an object more than others in the same category as a result of an extraordinarity of that object that does not, in itself, change the value.
  
• Focusing effect — prediction bias occurring when people place too much importance on one aspect of an event; causes error in accurately predicting the utility of a future outcome.
  
• Framing — Using an approach or description of the situation or issue that is too narrow. Also framing effect — drawing different conclusions based on how data is presented.
  
• Hyperbolic discounting — the tendency for people to have a stronger preference for more immediate payoffs relative to later payoffs, where the tendency increases the closer to the present both payoffs are.
  
• Illusion of control — the tendency for human beings to believe they can control or at least influence outcomes that they clearly cannot.
  
• Impact bias — the tendency for people to overestimate the length or the intensity of the impact of future feeling states.
  
• Information bias — the tendency to seek information even when it cannot affect action.
  
• Irrational escalation — the tendency to make irrational decisions based upon rational decisions in the past or to justify actions already taken.
  
• Just-world phenomenon - witnesses of an "inexplicable injustice . . . will rationalize it by searching for things that the victim might have done to deserve it"
  
• Loss aversion — "the disutility of giving up an object is greater than the utility associated with acquiring it".[6] (see also sunk cost effects and Endowment effect).
  
• Mere exposure effect — the tendency for people to express undue liking for things merely because they are familiar with them.
  
• Money illusion — the tendency of people to concentrate on the nominal (face value) of money rather than its value in terms of purchasing power.
  
• Moral credential effect — the tendency of a track record of non-prejudice to increase subsequent prejudice.
  
• Need for closure — the need to reach a verdict in important matters; to have an answer and to escape the feeling of doubt and uncertainty. The personal context (time or social pressure) might increase this bias.[7]
  
• Neglect of probability — the tendency to completely disregard probability when making a decision under uncertainty.
  
• Not Invented Here — the tendency to ignore that a product or solution already exists, because its source is seen as an "enemy" or as "inferior".
  
• Omission bias — the tendency to judge harmful actions as worse, or less moral, than equally harmful omissions (inactions).
  
• Outcome bias — the tendency to judge a decision by its eventual outcome instead of based on the quality of the decision at the time it was made.
  
• Planning fallacy — the tendency to underestimate task-completion times.
  
• Post-purchase rationalization — the tendency to persuade oneself through rational argument that a purchase was a good value.
  
• Pseudocertainty effect — the tendency to make risk-averse choices if the expected outcome is positive, but make risk-seeking choices to avoid negative outcomes.
  
• Reactance — the urge to do the opposite of what someone wants you to do out of a need to resist a perceived attempt to constrain your freedom of choice.
  
• Restraint bias - the tendency to overestimate one's ability to show restraint in the face of temptation.
  
• Selective perception — the tendency for expectations to affect perception.
  
• Semmelweis reflex — the tendency to reject new evidence that contradicts an established paradigm.
  
• Status quo bias — the tendency for people to like things to stay relatively the same (see also loss aversion, endowment effect, and system justification).
  Von Restorff effect — the tendency for an item that "stands out like a sore thumb" to be more likely to be remembered than other items.
  
• Wishful thinking — the formation of beliefs and the making of decisions according to what is pleasing to imagine instead of by appeal to evidence or rationality.
  
• Zero-risk bias — preference for reducing a small risk to zero over a greater reduction in a larger risk.

Biases in probability and belief

Many of these biases are often studied for how they affect business and economic decisions and how they affect experimental research.

• Ambiguity effect — the avoidance of options for which missing information makes the probability seem "unknown".
  
• Anchoring effect — the tendency to rely too heavily, or "anchor," on a past reference or on one trait or piece of information when making decisions (also called "insufficient adjustment").
  
• Attentional bias — neglect of relevant data when making judgments of a correlation or association.
  
• Authority bias — the tendency to value an ambiguous stimulus (e.g., an art performance) according to the opinion of someone who is seen as an authority on the topic.
  
• Availability heuristic — estimating what is more likely by what is more available in memory, which is biased toward vivid, unusual, or emotionally charged examples.
  
• Availability cascade — a self-reinforcing process in which a collective belief gains more and more plausibility through its increasing repetition in public discourse (or "repeat something long enough and it will become true").
  
• Belief bias — an effect where someone's evaluation of the logical strength of an argument is biased by the believability of the conclusion.
  
• Clustering illusion — the tendency to see patterns where actually none exist.
  
• Capability bias — The tendency to believe that the closer average performance is to a target, the tighter the distribution of the data set.
  
• Conjunction fallacy — the tendency to assume that specific conditions are more probable than general ones.
  
• Disposition effect — the tendency to sell assets that have increased in value but hold assets that have decreased in value.
  
• Gambler's fallacy — the tendency to think that future probabilities are altered by past events, when in reality they are unchanged. Results from an erroneous conceptualization of the normal distribution. For example, "I've flipped heads with this coin five times consecutively, so the chance of tails coming out on the sixth flip is much greater than heads."
  Hawthorne effect — the tendency of people to perform or perceive differently when they know that they are being observed.
  
• Hindsight bias — sometimes called the "I-knew-it-all-along" effect, the inclination to see past events as being predictable.
  
• Illusory correlation — beliefs that inaccurately suppose a relationship between a certain type of action and an effect.[10]
  
• Ludic fallacy — the analysis of chance-related problems according to the belief that the unstructured randomness found in life resembles the structured randomness found in games, ignoring the non-gaussian distribution of many real-world results.
  
• Neglect of prior base rates effect — the tendency to neglect known odds when reevaluating odds in light of weak evidence.
  
• Observer-expectancy effect — when a researcher expects a given result and therefore unconsciously manipulates an experiment or misinterprets data in order to find it (see also subject-expectancy effect).
  
• Optimism bias — the systematic tendency to be over-optimistic about the outcome of planned actions.
  
• Ostrich effect — ignoring an obvious (negative) situation.
  
• Overconfidence effect — excessive confidence in one's own answers to questions. For example, for certain types of question, answers that people rate as "99% certain" turn out to be wrong 40% of the time.

To be continued on next post................. *yes there are alot

*


[edit on 27-10-2009 by Watcher-In-The-Shadows]

Continued from previous post......

• Positive outcome bias — a tendency in prediction to overestimate the probability of good things happening to them (see also wishful thinking, optimism bias, and valence effect).
  
• Pareidolia — vague and random stimulus (often an image or sound) are perceived as significant, e.g., seeing images of animals or faces in clouds, the man in the moon, and hearing hidden messages on records played in reverse.
  
• Primacy effect — the tendency to weigh initial events more than subsequent events.
  
• Recency effect — the tendency to weigh recent events more than earlier events (see also peak-end rule).
  
• Disregard of regression toward the mean — the tendency to expect extreme performance to continue.
  
• Selection bias — a distortion of evidence or data that arises from the way that the data are collected.
  
• Stereotyping — expecting a member of a group to have certain characteristics without having actual information about that individual.
  
• Subadditivity effect — the tendency to judge probability of the whole to be less than the probabilities of the parts.
  
• Subjective validation — perception that something is true if a subject's belief demands it to be true. Also assigns perceived connections between coincidences.
  
• Telescoping effect — the effect that recent events appear to have occurred more remotely and remote events appear to have occurred more recently.
  
• Texas sharpshooter fallacy — the fallacy of selecting or adjusting a hypothesis after the data is collected, making it impossible to test the hypothesis fairly. Refers to the concept of firing shots at a barn door, drawing a circle around the best group, and declaring that to be the target.

Social biases

Most of these biases are labeled as attributional biases.

• Actor-observer bias — the tendency for explanations of other individuals' behaviors to overemphasize the influence of their personality and underemphasize the influence of their situation (see also fundamental attribution error). However, this is coupled with the opposite tendency for the self in that explanations for our own behaviors overemphasize the influence of our situation and underemphasize the influence of our own personality.
  
• Egocentric bias — occurs when people claim more responsibility for themselves for the results of a joint action than an outside observer would.
  
• Forer effect (aka Barnum Effect) — the tendency to give high accuracy ratings to descriptions of their personality that supposedly are tailored specifically for them, but are in fact vague and general enough to apply to a wide range of people. For example, horoscopes.
  
• False consensus effect — the tendency for people to overestimate the degree to which others agree with them.
  
• Fundamental attribution error — the tendency for people to over-emphasize personality-based explanations for behaviors observed in others while under-emphasizing the role and power of situational influences on the same behavior (see also actor-observer bias, group attribution error, positivity effect, and negativity effect).
  
• Halo effect — the tendency for a person's positive or negative traits to "spill over" from one area of their personality to another in others' perceptions of them (see also physical attractiveness stereotype).
  
• Herd instinct — Common tendency to adopt the opinions and follow the behaviors of the majority to feel safer and to avoid conflict.
  
• Illusion of asymmetric insight — people perceive their knowledge of their peers to surpass their peers' knowledge of them.
  
• Illusion of transparency — people overestimate others' ability to know them, and they also overestimate their ability to know others.
  
• Illusory superiority — overestimating one's desirable qualities, and underestimating undesirable qualities, relative to other people. Also known as Superiority bias (also known as "Lake Wobegon effect", "better-than-average effect", "superiority bias", or Dunning-Kruger effect).
  
• Ingroup bias — the tendency for people to give preferential treatment to others they perceive to be members of their own groups.
  Just-world phenomenon — the tendency for people to believe that the world is just and therefore people "get what they deserve."
  
• Notational bias — a form of cultural bias in which a notation induces the appearance of a nonexistent natural law.
  
• Outgroup homogeneity bias — individuals see members of their own group as being relatively more varied than members of other groups.
  
• Projection bias — the tendency to unconsciously assume that others share the same or similar thoughts, beliefs, values, or positions.
  
• Self-serving bias (also called "behavioral confirmation effect") — the tendency to claim more responsibility for successes than failures. It may also manifest itself as a tendency for people to evaluate ambiguous information in a way beneficial to their interests (see also group-serving bias).
  
• Self-fulfilling prophecy — the tendency to engage in behaviors that elicit results which will (consciously or not) confirm existing attitudes.[11]
  
• System justification — the tendency to defend and bolster the status quo. Existing social, economic, and political arrangements tend to be preferred, and alternatives disparaged sometimes even at the expense of individual and collective self-interest. (See also status quo bias.)
  
• Trait ascription bias — the tendency for people to view themselves as relatively variable in terms of personality, behavior and mood while viewing others as much more predictable.
  
• Ultimate attribution error — Similar to the fundamental attribution error, in this error a person is likely to make an internal attribution to an entire group instead of the individuals within the group.

Memory errors

Further information: Memory bias

• Consistency bias — incorrectly remembering one's past attitudes and behaviour as resembling present attitudes and behaviour.
  
• Cryptomnesia — a form of misattribution where a memory is mistaken for imagination.
  
• Egocentric bias — recalling the past in a self-serving manner, e.g. remembering one's exam grades as being better than they were, or remembering a caught fish as being bigger than it was
  
• False memory — confusion of imagination with memory, or the confusion of true memories with false memories.
  
• Hindsight bias — filtering memory of past events through present knowledge, so that those events look more predictable than they actually were; also known as the 'I-knew-it-all-along effect'.
  
• Reminiscence bump — the effect that people tend to recall more personal events from adolescence and early adulthood than from other lifetime periods.
  
• Rosy retrospection — the tendency to rate past events more positively than they had actually rated them when the event occurred.
  
• Self-serving bias — perceiving oneself responsible for desirable outcomes but not responsible for undesirable ones.
  
• Suggestibility — a form of misattribution where ideas suggested by a questioner are mistaken for memory.

SOURCE:en.wikipedia.org...


Thoughts? Comments? Identified any of these in yourself or others? Who? What?

[edit on 27-10-2009 by Watcher-In-The-Shadows]

reply to post by Watcher-In-The-Shadows


bent, tendency b : an inclination of temperament or outlook; especially : a personal and sometimes unreasoned judgment : prejudice c : an instance of such prejudice d (1) : deviation of the expected value of a statistical estimate from the quantity it estimates (2) : systematic error introduced into sampling or testing by selecting or encouraging one outcome or answer over others

For a minute there I thought you were calling me on my BS.

S & F

Thanks

reply to post by SLAYER69


Actually. I am attempting to call ALL OF US on our respective BS. Me included.

Well that certainly is a lot to take in at once. Don't you know I have an incredibly short attention span? J/K

Anyhow I'll be the first to admit that I have been guilty of at least a dozen of those listed on a semi-regular basis. It's a good thread to read to not only examine yourself but to help sniff out the more pervasive bs that can be found on ATS. Excellent post, hopefully this gets read by many. Keep up the good fight my friend.

reply to post by Osiris1953


"“If you know the enemy and know yourself you need not fear the results of a hundred battles.” -Sun Tzu

Though I honestly don't think of anyone I debate as a enemy, more as an opponent. I think to think of them as enemies would be the first step down a wrong headed path.

And incidently it is my humble opinion that the most abused is the "Bias Blind Spot" which may or may not be intentional as it is rather hard to examine one's self at times.

reply to post by Watcher-In-The-Shadows


I agree, but I would contend that the bias blind spot is also probably the most difficult to combat when dealing with yourself.

I like that you sprinkled some Sun Tzu in there. It reminds me that I've been meaning to read the Art of War again.

reply to post by Osiris1953


Agreed. Tzu Sun was a very wise man and I think I need to read it again as well.

Also, something I people fail to notice. Media is naturally going to cater to the bias of it's reader/viewer/userbase. Be it alternative, MSM, or whatever else....

I wish I could have an APP for this...

I love the definitions, probably will add this to my Fav ATS threads, just to keep a log on them all!

I'm a fiend for anything that is Noun-Effect.

GJ WITS!

(also good acronym......?)

Great job, perhaps a sequal......perhaps?

[edit on 28-10-2009 by Republican08]