behaviour
The confirmation trap
The rule
Once we pick a side, we hunt for facts that agree and quietly skip the ones that disagree. It feels like research but it is really comfort.
Where it flips
Hunting for facts against you can tip into never deciding at all. Where it misleads: you never commit. The fix: write down what would prove you wrong, then go look for exactly that first, before you look for support.
Once we form a view, like "this stock is great," we read only the happy reports. We follow only the people who agree. We explain away the bad news. It feels like research, but it is really a hunt for comfort. And it lets a weak idea live far longer than it should.
A worked example
Holding a losing stock, an investor reads five cheerful forum posts and skips the auditor's warning. He decides the market is "just wrong" about a business that is truly getting worse. [illustrative]
How to spot it
- ·reading only views that agree with you
- ·bad news explained away
- ·no written note of "what would change my mind"
Peter Wason · Behavioural finance research