Selective Perception
Our expectations affect how we perceive and filter information.
Selective perception is the tendency to not notice and more quickly forget stimuli that cause emotional discomfort or contradict prior beliefs. We subconsciously filter information that does not align with our existing worldview. Sports fans watching the same game will each see more fouls committed by the opposing team because they selectively perceive events confirming their team's victimhood.
What it looks like in the wild.
- Politics Partisan News Watching A conservative and a liberal watching the same debate reach opposite conclusions about who won, because each selectively perceived the moments that supported their prior belief.
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.
A chef who believes a new ingredient is bland uses less of it in a dish, then declares the dish lacks flavor without considering other factors.
Lena believes her neighborhood is becoming unsafe. She meticulously notes every instance of graffiti, but overlooks the new community garden and increased police patrols.
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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