Bias number 14 is known as the bandwagon effect. This is a social cognitive bias that affects people’s short-term decision-making and resulting actions.

It is what is says on the tin. In essence, people jump on a bandwagon of a trend as more and more people support it. Whether we’re talking about a fashion statement or a social movement, people adopt a trend to conform. As the trend increases in popularity, so too does the size of the bandwagon.

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Bias number 13 is known as the backfire effect. This is a cognitive bias that affects the core belief systems of people.

In short, the backfire effect operates when a person strengthens his or her beliefs in spite of facts that present an opposing reality.

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Bias number 12 is known as the availability heuristic, also known as the availability bias. This is a cognitive bias that governs how people evaluate information by drawing on the immediate recall of examples to make assessments of situations, topics or decisions.

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Bias number 11 is known as the availability cascade. This is a social cognitive bias that explains the cycle of beliefs to which people subscribe, regardless of the legitimacy of the idea or the presence of facts.

This bias is particularly present in social circles in which people seek to gain social acceptance from others.

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​Bias number 10 is known as the automation bias. This bias, sitting in the category of social psychology, demonstrates how humans have an unreliable relationship with answers provided by automated decision-making systems, even if contradictory evidence derived without automation is proven to be correct.

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Bias number nine is known as the authority bias. This bias belongs in the category of social cognitive biases.

This bias does what it says on the tin. It’s the bias that many humans have towards an authority figure. We believe that a person or organisation must merit its position of authority, and as a result, we tend to comply with requests made of us by these figures.
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Bias number eight is known as the attribute substitution bias. This bias underlies many cognitive biases and perceptual illusions that affect the human decision-making process.

When confronted with a question that is computationally complex, human beings will choose a heuristic decision-making approach, or a rapid judgement based on intuition over the more challenging, self-aware reflective approach.

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Bias number seven is called attentional bias. As the name suggests, this bias refers to the way in which a person’s perception is affected by the selective focus of thoughts on a particular topic.

People are limited by this bias when their ability to see and accept alternative possibilities is impaired by the focus on a narrow aspect of an overall picture.

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Bias number six is called anthropomorphism. This is a cognitive bias that human beings use to make judgements about their environment.

Specifically, human beings use their own experience as the basis of judgement for the experience of another non-human entity. 

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Bias number five is called anthropocentrism. This is a cognitive bias that governs the way human beings relate to their environment.

Anthropocentrism, or homocentrism, is the belief that human beings are the most important entities in the Universe. Many believe it is this bias that...

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