Paper 2 Organization of research - outline cause effect

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Cause & Effect Essay Outline: Confirmation Bias Use the material from your reaction document to fill out this outline . Just copy the excerpt [signal phrase w/author + quote or paraphrase] and your reaction, then paste it under the appropriate category. It’s ok if some material feels repetitive – you are just organizing at this point. You will eventually decide what stays and what goes when you draft. You might also have material that doesn’t fit these categories – that’s ok! You can decide if you’d like to add another category (as long as it is relevant) or decide not to use that particular excerpt at all. This outline will also help you see if you are missing anything and need to do a bit more research. [Tip: Color code the categories, then go through your reaction document and highlight the excerpts with corresponding color.] 1. Introduction o Hook (Can you come up with a creative narrative story that helps frame the topic and explain why it is important? Example: I might use the “Fake News” social media post I spoke to you about – how that was an example of my own confirmation bias) I want my hook to open with a personal story about confirmation bias. I have to think about experiences I experienced confirmation bias. o Thesis (Use thesis developed from class) Confirmation bias is an unconscious act in our minds that persuade our decisions without us even realizing and can lead to irrational decisions, compulsion and ignorance. 2. Definition (Explain it to your reader; you may want to give examples) Nicholas Kristof states in the New York Times, “…I do believe that all of us, on both sides, frequently spend more time demonizing the other side than trying to understand it, and we all suffer a cognitive bias that makes us inclined to seek out news sources that confirm our worldview.” Confirmation bias is often seen in our daily tendency’s day to day. When someone has confirmation bias towards a factor, they may leave out evidence that may weaken their argument and this is where confirmation bias can go bad. An example Ray Nickerson gives is in a court scenario and states, “…the motivated type of confirmation bias is clearly seen in the behavior of attorneys arguing a case in court. They present only evidence that they hope will increase the probability of a desired outcome.” Ray Nickerson demonstrates a real-life example to farther his claim on confirmation bias. Many people have interests in television shows that are related to crime so they can relate the example to the show. According to Ray Nickerson in The Conversation, “Motivated confirmation bias expresses itself in selectivity: selectivity in the data one pays attention to and selectivity with respect to how one processes those data.” Ray Nickerson reflects on the common term many use, ‘selective

hearing.’ By stating this, he uses pathos by using personal experiences the reader could have experienced. Nicholas Kristof provided a study that studied conformation bias and wrote, “people on both sides were eager to get intelligent arguments reinforcing their views… neither Democrats nor Republicans were interested in intelligent arguments challenging their own views.” The study provided by Nicholas Kristof demonstrates an example for the audience to be able to apply what they learned to a scenario that many people are aware of. For example, the presidential debate is filled with confirmation bias because there is one top leader position, and everyone wants it. In his article Ray Nickerson wrote, “Confirmation bias is usually described as a tendency to notice or search out information that confirms what one already believes, or would like to believe, and to avoid or discount information that’s contrary to one’s beliefs or preferences. This allows the reader to get another view of the definition through another author. By writing this quote, Ray Nickerson helps the reader understand confirmation bias better by allowing another in-dept definition. According to Dr. Shahram Heshmat in Psychology Today, “…we often deceive ourselves, such as stating: just this one; it’s not that fattening; I’ll stop smoking tomorrow. Or when someone is “under the influence” he feels confident that he can drive safely even after three or more drinks.” Dr. Heshmat demonstrates pathos to have the audience think back to their own life. Many people often tell themselves these small white lies to make themselves feel better even though, it will never happen. Discussed in The Decision Lab in the article, why we interpret information favoring our existing beliefs, states, “it is a cognitive strategy that we use to look for evidence that best supports our hypotheses, and the most readily available hypotheses are the ones we already have.” To help people better understand confirmation bias, researchers found it to be a cognitive strategy. When coming from a more psychology perspective, it allows the audience to be able to use prior knowledge to understand confirmation bias. 3. Causes (Why does it happen?) According to Paul Stapleton in Teaching in Higher Education, "because our cognitive biases typically become entrenched by early adulthood, simple didactic teaching, or awareness- raising about them is insufficient. Repeated exposure to and practice with various research scenarios, similar to the ones outlined throughout this essay, are required to reduce or avoid our tendencies to be attracted to the most obvious explanations and causes." Confirmation bias is an unconscious act that we learn at such young age however, it is something we can change about ourselves. Paul Stapleton helps the audience understand confirmation bias better by stating, “cognitive biases, i.e. mistakes in reasoning related to holding onto personal preferences and beliefs despite contrary information, can have an important influence on data analysis when

conducting research, but they tend to be overlooked by research methods textbooks and courses that use these books.” Confirmation bias is seen more often than you can imagine. Often when a person is trying to prove their point to an argument, they will look past all of the negative points to their argument and only speak on behalf of the good points. According to Dianne Barth in How Confirmation Bias Affects You Every Single Day, “Neuropsychologists like Daniel Siegel tell us that once a belief pattern has been established, our neurons want to fire in line with that pattern, which makes it difficult to change a belief system.”When someone is used to a constant pattern, it’s hard to change the pattern once its routine. This can be applied to confirmation bias because if a person their whole life was taught to only see their side and nothing else, they’ll carry that trait throughout their lives. However, if how to avoid confirmation bias is taught early on, it can be stopped. The reasoning behind confirmation bias that Paul Stapleton stated, “A deeper look at some of these cognitive biases, however, suggests that research methods courses could benefit from an inclusion of some common thinking biases and errors because they are so closely tied to scientific inquiry.”Confirmation bias is being researched and evaluated daily. Many researchers have created research methods in hope to find reasonings and ways to improve. According to the publishers of A Digital Nudge to Counter Confirmation Bias wrote, “An echo chamber is a situation in which an individual can only hear echoes of things that have already been said.” Many people overtime will come across fake news and we sometimes may find ourselves believing theses fake articles. Along with these fake articles, it comes with the people who spread the fakes news like rapid fire. However, if these people would understand the term confirmation bias, fake news would rarely spread. To show the positive side of positive thinking and confirmation bias Dr. Shahram Heshmat writes, “In some cases, self-deception is good for us… when dealing with certain illnesses, positive thinking may actually be beneficial for diseases such as cancer, but not diabetes or ulcers.” This demonstrates positive ways to look at confirmation bias. This shows the reader that there can be positive thinking with confirmation in some scenarios. 4. Effects (What are the results?) According to Nicholas Kristof in the New York Times, “But as a progressive myself, steeped in the liberal worldview, I must say that I often learn a lot -- however painfully -- from these conservatives with whom I utterly disagree, partly because they gleefully seize upon inconvenient facts that my side tends to ignore because they don't fit our narrative.” Nicholas Kristof shows that conformation bias isn’t a good thing. When Kristof opens his mind and accepts there is another side of the argument and learns about the other side, he learns a lot of information.

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As stated in Why we interpret information favoring our existing beliefs, “in a culture of groupthink, the bias can hinder group decision making by contributing to the assumption that harmony and group coherence are the values most crucial to success.” Often, confirmation bias is seen in group activities or scenarios involving many people. In example, the presidential debate is a phenomenal example of confirmation bias. Both parties’ goals are to win the election and do whatever you have to win. This results in sometimes the presidential candidate to speak on his behalf and act as if he’s perfect even though we all know he’s not. According to Peter Wehner in Seeing Through a Glass, Darkly, “our beliefs are also often tied up with our ideas about who we are individually and our group identity. The result is that changing our beliefs in light of new evidence can cause us to be rejected by our political community.” Many people like to adapt to the social norm and its not uncommon because no one likes to be rejected. 5. Solutions (Is there anything we can do to stop or avoid it? Peter Wehner wrote in Seeing Through a Glass, Darkly, “these presuppositions caused me to ignore, much longer than I should have, the problems inherent in our occupation strategy. I didn't question early enough the errors we made or how the situation was unraveling.” Confirmation bias is overlooked by many people, scientists had to do research on the topic for some people to believe. However, if we learn at a younger age what confirmation bias is and how to avoid it, we can all change. 6. Conclusion (Remind your reader what you’ve proved, and end with an analysis – why is it important for your reader to understand the topic?) According to Dr. Charles Rock in “Five ways to take confirmation bias out of your experimental results, “Scientists understand the importance of having their science reviewed by experts who did not participate in the research, but peer review usually comes after they have decided their work is worthy…” Often when working on a project or research so passionately, you get lost in the information and you fall under confirmation bias. However, Dr. Rock suggests that having their data reviewed by someone who isn’t part of the study, will allow you to have the most accurate information to give. In schools, teachers often have students peer review other students’ papers to help get the best grade possible. Before spreading the news, you may think is real, you should have someone else’s opinion and views on the article. Doctor Shahram Heshmat wrote in Psychology Today, “some people will have a very strong inclination to dismiss any claims that marijuana may cause harm as nothing more than old- fashioned reefer madness.” Doctor Heshmat demonstrates a real-life example that can relate to today news. As we know, many states are in the process of legalizing marijuana. This is a huge controversial topic in news and many people fall under confirmation bias.

7. Works Cited (list all sources here in MLA format) Kristof, Nicholas. "You're Wrong! I'm Right!" The New York Times . 17 February 2018, www.nytimes.com/2018/02/17/opinion/sunday/liberal-conservative-divide.html Nickerson, Ray. “Confirmation bias: A psychological phenomenon that helps explain why pundits got it wrong” The Conversation. 21 November 2016, file:///Users/stephbordenabe/Downloads/Confirmation%20bias_%20A%20psychological %20phenomenon%20that%20helps%20explain%20why%20pundits%20got%20it%20wrong.pdf Heshmat Ph.D., Shahram. “What is Confirmation Bias?” Psychology Today. 23 April 2015, file:///Users/stephbordenabe/Downloads/What%20Is%20Confirmation%20Bias_%20_ %20Psychology%20Today%20(1).pdf “Why we interpret information favoring our existing beliefs.” The Decision Lab. 12 January 2021, file:///Users/stephbordenabe/Downloads/Confirmation%20Bias%20-%20Definition%20&%20Examples %20_%20The%20Decision%20Lab.pdf Stapleton, Paul. “Avoiding Cognitive Biases: Promoting Good Decision Making in Research Methods Courses.” Teaching in Higher Education, vol. 24, no. 4, May 2019, file:///Users/stephbordenabe/Downloads/confirmationbias%20(2).pdf Wehner, Peter. “Seeing Through a Glass, Darkly.” The New York Times. 8 October 2017, file:///Users/stephbordenabe/Downloads/Seeing%20Through%20a%20Glass_%20Darkly-1.pdf Thornhill, Calum., Meeus, Quentin., Peperkamp, Jeroen., Berendt, Bettina. “A Digital Nudge to Counter Confirmation Bias.” Frontiers in Big Data. 6 June 2019, https://www.frontiersin.org/articles/10.3389/fdata.2019.00011/full Barth, Dianne. “How Confirmation Bias Affects You Every Single Day.” Psychology Today. 31 December 2017, https://www.psychologytoday.com/us/blog/the-couch/201712/how- confirmation-bias-affects-you-every-single-day Rock, Charles PhD. “Five ways to take confirmation bias out of your experimental results.” St. Jude Progress. 17 January 2018, https://blogs.stjude.org/progress/avoiding-confirmation-bias-scientific- research/#:~:text=Five%20tips%20to%20prevent%20confirmation%20bias&text=Encourage%20and %20carefully%20consider%20critical,to%20actually%20test%20the%20hypothesis .

Paper 2 Organization of research - outline cause effect

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