Overcoming Meta-Cognitive Myopia

• Applicant: Professor Dr. Klaus Fiedler
• Subject Area: Social Psychology, Industrial and Organisational Psychology
• Term: from 2014 to 2018
• Project identifier: Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft (DFG) - Project number 263726490

Convergent evidence from numerous studies points to metacognitive myopia as a major obstacle in the way of rational thinking and action. Although people are often remarkably accurate in utilizing the information given in a sample, even in complex task settings, they are naive and uncritical regarding the origin and validity of the sample. Taking even obviously biased and misleading sample information for granted, judges and decision makers succumb to the very biases and distortions that happen to be inherent in the sample input. While previous research on metacognitive myopia (reviewed in Fiedler, 2012) highlights the persistence of this syndrome and its resistance to treatment, the present research project is devoted to three sorts of possible remedies that may help to overcome meta-cognitive myopia: (1) error-sensitive feedback procedures; (2) social conflicts in collective reasoning; and (3) analogical reasoning aids. The potential of these three classes of remedies will be tested with reference to meta-cognitive myopia in three theoretical paradigms: (a) neglect of sample size; (b) confusion in conditional reasoning; and (c) the failure to take aggregation-level effects into account.

• DFG Programme: Priority Programmes
• Subproject of: SPP 1516: New Frameworks of Rationality
• Participating Persons: Professorin Dr. Mandy Hütter; Professor Dr. Florian Luitpold Wilhelm Kutzner