The Confirmation-Bias Problem

The Confirmation-Bias Problem is one of The Four Trolls of Thoughtland. It refers to our natural tendency to seek out, interpret, and remember information in a way that confirms our existing beliefs.

When we have a new product idea, we are often emotionally invested in it. We want it to be successful, so we are more likely to pay attention to information that supports our idea and to dismiss information that contradicts it.

This can lead us to:

• Ask leading questions in market research that are designed to elicit positive responses.
• Misinterpret ambiguous data as evidence that our idea is a good one.
• Ignore negative feedback or explain it away as an outlier.

Confirmation bias can be a major obstacle to objective decision-making. To overcome it, it's important to:

• Be aware of your own biases.
• Actively seek out disconfirming evidence.
• Design experiments that are as objective as possible.
• Involve people with different perspectives in the decision-making process.

Pretotyping can help to mitigate confirmation bias by focusing on collecting objective data about user behavior, rather than subjective opinions.