How do People Choose Between Biased Information Sources? Evidence from a Laboratory Experiment

Gary Charness, Ryan Oprea and Sevgi Yuksel

Journal of the European Economic Association, 2021, vol. 19, issue 3, 1656-1691

Abstract: People in our experiment choose between two information sources with opposing biases in order to inform their guesses about a binary state. By varying the nature of the bias, we vary whether it is optimal to consult information sources biased towards or against prior beliefs. Even in our deliberately-abstract setting, there is strong evidence of confirmation-seeking and to a lesser extent contradiction-seeking heuristics leading people to choose information sources biased towards or against their priors. Analysis of post-experiment survey questions suggests that subjects follow these rules due to fundamental errors in reasoning about the relative informativeness of biased information sources.

Date: 2021
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Citations: View citations in EconPapers (19)

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Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:oup:jeurec:v:19:y:2021:i:3:p:1656-1691.

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