information silo

I Saw It On the Internet So It Must Be True

I Saw It On the Internet So It Must Be True

Understanding Confirmation Bias

When you see a story on the Internet that matches what you already believe, it feels true. Right. Everything you’d expect to see in the world. And when you see a story that doesn’t match your beliefs, you’re more likely to be skeptical and doubt the veracity of the information. That’s what confirmation bias is all about. It’s about confirming what you believe, whether or not it’s actually true.

According to Psychology Today, confirmation bias “occurs from the direct influence of desire on beliefs.” It makes sense, really. Who goes around thinking, “I’m wrong! I’m wrong!”? If you think you’re right, you’ll naturally tend towards information confirming your beliefs. Technology LOVES to enable that for you!

How Technology Makes Confirmation Bias Worse

Confirmation bias isn’t new, but technology today makes it easier to experience. Content providers like YouTube and Instagram want you to spend time on their sites. The more time you spend with them, the more money they make. And they encourage you to spend that time by feeding you stories or posts related to what you’ve viewed and spent time on in the past. (We talked about this in our post on Information Silos.) The more times you see posts that align with your beliefs, the more confirmation you’ll receive that your beliefs are true.

Technology does more than just guide us towards material it thinks we’ll want to see. The sheer amount of information out there means people have to make pretty hard choices about what they pay attention to. The World Economic Forum recently reported that people spend an average of 2.5 hours a day on social media. Expand that to just surfing the web, and that goes up to an average of 7 hours a day! With that much information flowing through our devices into our heads, is it any wonder people will key into what makes them feel better about what they think they know?

So what, though? Why is it a problem that the Internet confirms my belief that cats are gods and rule the world? As long as that’s as far as it goes, it isn’t. Unfortunately, there is a lot of evidence that confirmation bias feeds more than viral memes. It also feeds extremist viewpoints and scary organizations. 

What Can You Do About Confirmation Bias in 5 Minutes

  • Rather than searching for information that matches what you know, try looking for information to refute the idea. For example, don’t just search for the “best.” Also, try the corresponding search for the “worst.”
  • Before you share a post or an idea online, stop for a second and ask yourself whether you’d still believe and share this information if the opposite was published by the same experts and sources?

What Can You Do About Confirmation Bias in 15 Minutes

  • Rather than trying to prove something to be true, spend a few minutes trying to prove it false, either by searching for different terms or becoming your own “devil’s advocate.’
  • Spend time looking through the sites listed on Media Bias/Fact Check and pick at least one news source outside your usual preference. 

What Can You Do About Confirmation Bias in 30 Minutes (or more)

  • You can do this one by yourself or with a team. Try running your belief through an exercise called the Six Thinking Hats. This technique takes a while to work through, but the idea is that you approach solving a problem or thinking through an idea in six different ways: structured, creative, positive, emotional, critical, and factual. The point is to do all six because they’ll each allow for exploration of a different facet of the topic. By the time you’ve gone through all six, you’ll be closer to a more well-rounded truth than you were before.

Wrap Up

Confirmation bias isn’t a technology problem, though technology definitely offers the perfect environment to feed this way of thinking. As long as you’re aware of it and willing to step back when needed, you can go on being quite certain that cats are gods. After all, you saw that truth on the Internet – it must be true!

Posted by heather in Communication, Line Dancing, 0 comments