What Is Cognitive Bias And How Does It Affect Decision-Making?

By Mark R Stephens

Are you a successful decision-maker? Do you, more often than not, choose the right decision?

Ask most people these questions and they would probably think they do okay, without being perfect. Lack of perfection would be no surprise to any neuroscientist, because the decision-making process is known to face many challenges.

Emotion is likely to ‘hijack’ decision-making at any moment; and then there is cognitive bias, which can cause us to make decisions based on predetermined perceptions rather than the facts at hand.

It may be surprising to readers that, in business, where it is tempting to assume that decisions are always made rationally and logically, these biases apply just as much as they do to other decisions we make.

What is cognitive bias?

Consider the many recent cases of the unjustified killings of black people by police in the USA; this may provide a clearer idea of how cognitive bias play outs in the most serious cases.

Cognitive bias is defined as a systematic pattern of deviation from norm or rationality in judgment, whereby inferences about other people and situations may be drawn in an illogical fashion.

While we must be careful of making generalisations with the aforementioned shootings, there may be no outwardly racist motive involved in them; but it is highly possible that cognitive bias was a key reason for the police offers acting the way they did.

Our own perception of reality is based upon our cognitive biases, which sometimes fly in the face of the objective input i.e. what’s really happening, the facts etc. By definition, our own version of reality is subjective, and our behaviour is based upon that.

How does it affect our decision-making?

In the example given, a black policeman may not perceive the same sense of threat as a white policeman in the same situation. A less intense cognitive bias in this particular situation might lead to different decisions and different behaviour.

This also helps to explain why you may not make the best decisions in the workplace or at home; your cognitive bias may distort the facts and lead to inaccurate judgment, illogical interpretation, or “irrationality”.

Just to be clear – we are all victims, to an extent, of cognitive bias. It is normal. Indeed, in the case of many everyday situations we face, cognitive biases can help us make the fast decisions necessary to go about our daily business effectively.

However, being aware of cognitive bias, especially when making more challenging decisions, can help prevent the mistakes and errors of judgment that may have serious consequences.

Most readers here will not face life and death situations like policemen do; but we all have to make decisions constantly every day. So, by increasing our awareness of how we arrive at these decisions, and how to combat some of the most serious challenges to good decision-making, we clearly benefit.

Since the 1980s, the field of neuroscience has been shedding more light on the workings of the brain and our understanding of the decision-making process is growing. Lists of typical cognitive biases have even been compiled, which should be of great interest to almost anyone in a professional field.

About

The NeuroPower Group is at the forefront of introducing new approaches to organisational development through the findings of neuroscience. We apply them to all types of businesses, developing high performing teams and enhancing leadership. Find out more at our website: http://www.neuropowergroup.com.