PSY30400 Chapter Notes - Chapter 13: Availability Heuristic, Representativeness Heuristic
Chapter 13: Judgement, Decisions, and Reasoning
• Illusory Correlations:
o occur when a correlation between two events appears to exist, but in reality,
there is no correlation or it is much weaker than it is assumed to be
▪ think two things are related when they are not
o May take the form of a stereotype
▪ an oversimplified generalization about a group or class of people that
often focuses on the negative
o Related to availability heuristic because selective attention to the stereotypical
behaviors makes these behaviors more available
o 2. Representative Heuristic:
▪ related to the idea that people often make judgments based on how
much one event resembles another
▪ The probability that A is a member of class B can be determined by how
well the properties of A resemble the properties we usually associate
with Class B
▪ Think about the example of the guy who likes to read a lot and wears
glasses
• more people said he was a librarian than a farmer
• These people were ignoring the base rate
o relative proportion of different classes in the population
find more resources at oneclass.com
find more resources at oneclass.com
