Positive thinking can feel like a job to do, while negative thinking seems to happen more automatically. In fact, this is true at a very fundamental level of the brain, studies show. It is called the negativity bias. Continue reading
The human brain is sophisticated. It separates us from all other animals. It allows us to have abstract ideas and to solve complex problems. We are rational social beings, or are we? Continue reading
When we are upset, we are hardly ever rational. This psychological phenomenon is the affect heuristic.
Do you feel that your emotions control what you think? Or do you find it difficult to be rational when you are emotional? Continue reading
Posted in Cognitive Bias, Cognitive Psychology
Tagged analytic thinking mode, cognitive bias, the affect heuristic
Dr. Albert Ellis was a practitioner of rational emotive behavior therapy. During his time as a therapist, he identified 12 irrational beliefs that many people have. Continue reading
Posted in Clinical Psychology, Cognitive Bias, Cognitive Psychology, Coping, Mental Health
Tagged beliefs, irrational
When we make decisions or judgments, we often use mental shortcuts. The purpose of mental shortcuts is to ease the “cognitive load” of making decisions.
Mental shortcuts are helpful because they allow us to make quick decisions, but sometimes they result in “thinking errors” or so-called cognitive biases. We should be aware of these biases because they prevent us from thinking rationally.
Posted in Cognitive Bias, Psychology
This scenario would provoke anxiety in many of us, but research finds that we tend to overestimate the emotional impact of future events.
People often overestimate the intensity and duration of their emotional reactions to future events. This tendency is called the impact bias, which is just one of many cognitive biases. Because of the impact bias, people fail to make the right decisions about their emotional reactions to future events.
Posted in Cognitive Bias
The hindsight bias is one of many cognitive biases, and it is defined as the belief that an event is more predictable after it becomes known than it was before it became known. As a result, people tend to view events are more predictable than they are. Continue reading
Posted in Cognitive Bias
Tagged cognitive bias, confidence, self-esteem, the hindsight bias
When we solve problems and make decisions and judgments, we very often use mental shortcuts (so-called heuristics). We use these heuristics if we neither have resources nor time to compare all available information before making a choice. In other words, heuristics ease the cognitive load of making a decision. Continue reading
My name is Simon Moesgaard, a psychologist from Denmark, and this is my blog about psychology.
