Ray Nickerson

Who they are

Nickerson's 1998 article appeared in the Review of General Psychology. It surveys experimental work on confirmation bias, applies the idea to real-world settings, and considers explanations for it and whether the bias is useful or harmful.

Key papers

Nickerson, R. S. (1998). Confirmation bias: A ubiquitous phenomenon in many guises. Review of General Psychology, 2(2), 175-220. doi:10.1037/1089-2680.2.2.175

The review treats confirmation bias as an umbrella term for several related habits: seeking evidence that favours a hypothesis, giving extra weight to supportive evidence, interpreting ambiguous material in the favoured direction, and remembering the past as more consistent with a view than it was. It follows the idea into medical diagnosis, jury verdicts and scientific resistance to new theories.

Key ideas

The review distinguishes a motivated form of the bias, in which people defend beliefs they value, from an unmotivated form, in which they are partial even on questions they care little about, and reports evidence for both. It notes that the term usually describes unwitting selectivity rather than the deliberate case-building of a lawyer or debater.

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