Essentialism
We categorize people and things as having an underlying essence that defines them.
Psychological essentialism is the view that categories have an underlying reality or true nature that one cannot observe directly but that gives an object its identity. People believe that group members (whether racial, gender, or species groups) share a hidden essence that causes their observable properties. This cognitive tendency underpins stereotyping, racism, and sexism by making category membership seem more fixed and meaningful than it is.
What it looks like in the wild.
- Everyday life Nature vs Nurture Someone insists that boys are 'naturally' more aggressive than girls, treating gender as a fixed essence rather than a complex outcome of biological and social factors.
Recognising a definition is not the same skill as spotting it.
Two scenarios from the app, with distractors drawn from the same family of biases — which is what makes them hard.
He insists that because a country has a history of political turmoil, its people are 'essentially' unstable, and any business partnership there is doomed to fail regardless of current conditions.
Pat believes all teenagers are inherently rebellious, so they dismiss their own child's reasonable request for a later curfew without discussion.
Biases rarely arrive alone.
Understand more. Assume less.
188 biases, 18,869 scenarios, and a record of how you actually decide.
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