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memory
You project your current knowledge onto your past self.
The 'hindsight bias' causes you to misremember your original state of ignorance.
Once you learn the solution to a problem, your brain struggles to simulate the state of not knowing. You implicitly assume that your past self had access to the information you hold now.
You are prone to believing you knew the outcome before it happened.
Where this comes from
- Study
- Fischhoff, 1975
- What the check found
- Baruch Fischhoff's 1975 paper 'Hindsight ≠ Foresight' established the bias. The claim correctly characterizes the 'knew-it-all-along' effect widely accepted in psychology literature.
- Confidence
- Solid, with limits
Related
One of these every day, and every one names the study it came from. When a finding is contested, it says so.