Knowledge curse (cognitive bias): what is it and how does it affect us?

The curse of knowledge produces interference in communication.

Cognitive biases are a type of psychological effect that causes us to deviate from reason and make irrational or inaccurate judgments. There are many of them, but here we will focus on one of them: the curse of knowledge..

As we will see, this bias often causes us to explain things on the assumption that the receivers of the message have more information than they actually do.

In this article we will explain how this bias has been studied and what other cognitive biases it is related to. We will also see what its consequences are (especially in the educational field) and how we can act to curb it and promote deeper learning and understanding in our listeners.

Curse of knowledge (cognitive bias): what is it?

The curse of knowledge is a cognitive bias that appears when a person who communicates with another/s, without realizing it, assumes that the other or others have the necessary background (at the level of information) to understand what he/she is explaining.

That is to say, this person presupposes that the people who are listening to him/her have more information than they really have. information than they actually have.

To better understand the effect of the curse of knowledge, let's take an example. Imagine a teacher who has to explain a subject to students who are beginners in that subject; that is, to students who really have no knowledge of the subject, and the teacher has difficulty in doing so, because he is not able to put himself in their place.

As a result, he explains things on the assumption that students already have prior knowledge of the subject.

Consequences

What are the consequences of the curse of knowledge? To begin with, that the people receiving the information do not understand what is being explained to them, but also that they misunderstand what is being explained.But also that misunderstandings occur, that we feel "stupid" as learners, that we feel we were not listening carefully enough, etc.

As for the person who falls into the curse of knowledge (e.g. the teacher), he/she may assume that what he/she is explaining is easy to understand, clear and direct, although it really is not.

Thus, both for the one who explains and for the one who receives or listens, interference is producedThis can lead to poor instruction (in education), but also to misunderstandings in a more social environment (e.g. in a conversation between friends).

Origin

How did the cognitive bias of the curse of knowledge arise? Curiously enough, it is a concept that does not come from psychology, but was coined by three economists: Colin Camerer, George Lovett, George Lovett and George Lovett.Colin Camerer, George Loewenstein and Martin Weber.

These economists published their contributions on this concept in the Journal of Political Economy. Specifically, the aim of their research was to prove that agents working in the field of economic analysis, who had more information at their disposal, could more accurately anticipate the judgment of less informed agents.

Research: hindsight bias

The research by these economists was based on another paper, this time by Baruch FischhoffFischhoff, an American researcher, in 1975.

What Fischhoff had investigated was another cognitive bias, this time called "hindsight bias", according to which when we know the outcome of a certain event, we think that we could have predicted it more easily than if we had not known the outcome.

That is, this is quite irrational, since according to the hindsight bias, we would tend to think that we could have predicted it more easily than if we had not known the outcome, we would tend to think that we could have predicted things just because we knew the outcome beforehand..

Moreover, this all occurs quite unconsciously, and according to Fischhoff's results, the participants in his research did not know that their knowledge regarding the final outcome could affect their responses (and in case they did know, they could not ignore the effects of hindsight bias).

A question of empathy?

But how does the curse of knowledge relate to this new cognitive bias? Basically, in this research by Fischhoff, it was observed how participants were unable to correctly reconstruct their previous, less informed states of knowledge.. This is directly related to the curse of knowledge, but how?

To understand it in simpler words, what Fischhoff said was that when we have knowledge about some topic or about some outcome, it is difficult to imagine how another person who does not really have such information thinks, since our mental state is "anchored" in the initial (retrospective) state that knows the results.

So, in a way, the effect of the curse of knowledge has to do also with a lack of empathy, at least at the cognitive level, since we are unable to put ourselves in the other person's shoes. we are unable to put ourselves in the place of the "unknowing" person.because we have settled in our state, which is that of a "knowledgeable" person (who has the information).

Applications

How is this cognitive phenomenon "applied" in daily life? We have seen how the cognitive bias of the curse of knowledge appears in areas such as education, but also in others: in our most social sphere, for example, when we interact in our day-to-day life with other people..

Thus, when we talk to other people, we often assume that they will understand what we are explaining to them because they have a previous base of information that they do not actually have. This can lead to interferences in communication, and even generate misunderstandings.

In the field of education, as we have already seen, this can also happen, How can we teach students without the phenomenon of the curse of knowledge interfering with their learning?

Basically, by putting ourselves in their shoes, and starting from their initial state of information on the subject. This may sound simple but it is not. It requires practice and an important exercise of "cognitive empathy".

To do so, we can try to go back to the origin, that is, to the moment when we, as teachers, did not have that information either. From this point on, the objective will be to explain from the base, without consciously assuming that the student knows more than he really does.

How to curb the curse of knowledge?

We have seen some ways to avoid the curse of knowledge, but since it seems to us an interesting and very practical issue in the educational field, above all, let's go deeper into this point.

Professor Christopher Reddy proposes several guidelines to avoid falling into this bias and promote more effective learning in students. in students. Let's get to know these guidelines in a very summarized way. How do we teach so that learning is deeper and longer lasting?

• By creating a previous pleasant emotion in the student.
• Through multisensory classes.
• By teaching over time, so that the brain can process what has been acquired.
• Explaining through narration.
• Using analogies and examples.
• Using novelty and surprise.
• Providing the learner with prior knowledge about the topic.

Bibliographical references:

• Fischhoff, B. (2003). Hindsight ≠ foresight: the effect of outcome knowledge on judgment under uncertainty. BMJ Quality & Safety, 12(4): 304-311.
• Froyd, J. & Layne, J. (2008). Faculty development strategies for overcoming the "curse of knowledge". 2008 38th Annual Frontiers in Education Conference.
• Kennedy, J. (1995). Debiasing the Curse of Knowledge in Audit Judgment. The Accounting Review, 70(2): pp. 249 - 273.
• Muñoz, A. (2011). The influence of cognitive biases on jurisdictional decisions: the human factor. An approach. InDret. Journal for the analysis of law.