Strength of hindsight bias as a consequence of meta-cognitions

Stefan Schwarz () and Dagmar Stahlberg ()
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Stefan Schwarz: Sonderforschungsbereich 504, Postal: L 13, 15, D-68131 Mannheim
Dagmar Stahlberg: Lehrstuhl fuer Sozialpsychologie, Sonderforschungsbereich 504, Postal: Seminargebaeude A5, D-68131 Mannheim

No 02-32, Sonderforschungsbereich 504 Publications from Sonderforschungsbereich 504, Universität Mannheim, Sonderforschungsbereich 504, University of Mannheim

Abstract: The hindsight bias is the tendency of people to falsely believe that they would have predicted the outcome of an event correctly, once the outcome is known. The present paper addresses the ongoing debate whether the hindsight bias is due to memory impairment or biased reconstruction. The memory impairment approach states that outcome information alters the memory trace for the initial judgment, whereas the biased reconstruction approach assumes that people who have forgotten their initial judgments are forced to guess and, in the presence of outcome information, are likely to use this information as an anchor. Whereas the latter approach emphasizes the role of meta-cognitive considerations, meta-cognitions are not included in the memory impairment explanation. Two experiments will be presented which show that the biased reconstruction explanation provides a better explanation for empirical findings in hindsight bias research than the memory impairment explanation.

Pages: 43 pages
Date: 2002-02-15
Note: Financial support from the Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft, SFB 504, at the University of Mannheim, is gratefully acknowledged.
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