Heuristics at work:
When it comes to heuristics, the one that pops out in my
mind the most is representativeness heuristics. That being said there is one
situation in which this came into play. I am a 31 year old mother of 4 and I
have multiple visible tattoos on my back, leg, arms. When someone sees me they
might think “oh, that lady has so many tattoos and she’s young and it’s the middle
of the day. She must be an unemployed leech of society collecting welfare and
food stamps while wasting her money on tattoos rather than supporting her own
self.” When in stark reality I am a stay at home mom working towards a
photojournalism degree while raising 4 children and also attend church 2 times
a week every single week; I also volunteer at my kid’s school and do many
different charity events.
I find this extremely annoying because not only do a
majority of people in this world have some sort of body art, they are also hard
working, contributing members of society. Just because we have body art we are
assumed heathens, criminals, or bums. The existing ideas of society pertaining
to this issue is what “pigeon-holes” us into a category of ill repute. I have
stopped trying to argue my case to those who think this way; instead I live my
life how I should and lead by example rather than cheap talk. Many are truly
surprised when they see me coming out of church or at a fundraiser event,
sometimes it is only then that they may change their minds on the subject; but
that is very rare.
My favorite bias:
Confirmation bias: The tendency to recall or interpret
information in a way to confirm one’s beliefs or hypotheses. The reason that this
particular type of bias most intrigued me is because to look at today’s
religious wars is to plainly see this type of bias in action. We have several
different religions that use their holy book and interpret it in ways they see
to fit their terrorist agendas. They go on claiming that killing all those who
are not affiliated with that religion to cleanse the earth of the “unwanted”. Christians,
Muslims, Buddhists, Pagans, Catholics, the list goes on and on. It is not
always associated with terrorism either, the subject can be related to contraception,
the existence of Heaven or Hell, the way a person should live their lives, what
commandments can be broken while still believing there would be a way to make
the journey and entry into the afterlife. It would take eons to decipher each
religions skewed view and misinterpretations by extremists.
The one bias that I
usually see in myself, friends or family is the hindsight bias. We all like to
claim that we knew what was coming but we kept hush hush because we are all too
superstitious to “jinx” it by saying what would happen first. I myself have
fell victim to this many times, especially when I hear of sad situations. I
claim to have known what would happen all along because of the circumstances
leading up to it.
Faulty Schemas:
The schema that has always been most present in my life is
the thought that those who have worked in an office, at a desk most their lives
do not know the true meaning of hard work. Obviously this is one instance in
which I have been wrong multiple times, but I still continue to hold on to this
notion. The implications were that many of those I categorized into this schema
had in fact had previous jobs in which they were particularly grueling, labor
intensive and hard on the body and mind, hence why the change of employment. I
still to this day am struggling with the concept that this is not always true.
The reason behind this in the first place was that my grandpa and dad always
taught me that if you didn’t have callused hands and wind chapped cheeks you
weren’t working hard enough. That you can get more satisfaction from knowing
you did a good job because you are achy, sore and beat then rolling around in a
chair playing with computers all day.
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