The logic of bias: using cognitive architecture to explore interactions between cognitive abilities and decision errors
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Authors
Lutsevich, Alexander
Issue Date
2024-12
Type
Electronic thesis
Thesis
Thesis
Language
en_US
Keywords
Cognitive science
Alternative Title
Abstract
Viewed as cognitive imperfections, biases have been thought to be responsible for hinderinghumans from fully making use of their reasoning abilities. Several recent strains of research,
however, have begun to emphasize the positive aspect of biases. For example, PSI architec-
ture (Dörner & Güss, 2013) views these as engineered by evolution to prevent dissatisfaction,
and promote subsequent satisfaction of human needs. Crucially, PSI assumes higher skills
and reasoning capacities to enable a higher degree of introspection and cognitive flexibility,
thus alleviating the effects of biases.
Recent work by Kahan et al. (2017) called this general assumption into question: sub-
jects with higher numeracy skills were not better protected from a polarized interpretation
of statistical data, if the data contradicted their political beliefs — instead, the effect of bias
was increased. It is unclear, however, how to situate these finding within the PSI framework,
as they could be attributed to being A. a general cognitive fallacy caused to a large extent
by modulations of perceptional and attentional processes not specific to group integrity; B.
rooted in the long-term forming of stable, habituated action patterns, associated with the
subject’s beliefs; or C. an effect indeed specific to groups with strong affiliative connections.
Each of the accounts above would warrant varying revisions to the architecture.
To test the account A above, I conducted a controlled experiment examining existential
needs using thirst as a general, negative stimulus unrelated prior beliefs/experiences. The
initial results indicated that the effect reported by Kahan et al. (2017) could not be repro-
duced. This suggests that account A. — the bias being a general cognitive fallacy - does not
fit. However, the average age of the sample was quite young, as compared to Kahan’s, and
left the the possibility for account B. — the bias being rooted in long-term stable, habituated
response patterns associated with beliefs, which did not have the time to form within the
undergraduates.
viii
Testing account B required disentangling long-term beliefs from group needs. For this,
sleep/wake patterns seemed to be a good fit, as they are not strongly related to affiliation.
I conducted a study analogous to our first, where the data and background story in the
statistical task either affirmed or contradicted the subject’s sleep patterns. To control for
confounds, I asked whether these are shared by their family, peers, and/or any other larger
group they belong to. Further, the subjects sleep/wake cycles must not be determined to
a large degree by external factors. As no direct manipulation of independent variables was
required for this study, I relegated subject recruitment and data collection was relegated to
the online platform Prolific (Palan & Schitter, 2018).
As here, too, Kahan et al.’s (2017) was not observed, it
The contributions of this work are the integration of the expert bias phenomenon into
the PSI architecture by:
1. Conducting behavioral studies to explore the underpinning dynamics responsible for
the production of this effect.
2. Interpreting the findings and transcribing them onto the logic of the architecture.
3. Drafting the consequent steps necessary to initialize a revision of PSI to fit the ex-
periments
Description
December 2024
School of Humanities, Arts, and Social Sciences
School of Humanities, Arts, and Social Sciences
Full Citation
Publisher
Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute, Troy, NY