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hindsight
You reshape your own memory to justify your past decisions.
Hindsight bias allows you to believe that past events were more predictable than they actually were at the time.
Once you know the outcome of an event, your brain automatically updates your memory to make the event seem inevitable. You rewrite your personal narrative to align with your current knowledge.
You are not remembering your past; you are editing it to make yourself look wiser.
Where this comes from
- Study
- Fischhoff, 1975, Journal of Experimental Psychology
- What the check found
- Fischhoff (1975) is the seminal paper defining hindsight bias as 'creeping determinism.' Although the provided reference material lacks the specific quote, the finding is widely established in psychology.
- 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.