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How the brain stops us learning from our mistakes – and what to do about it

<p>You learn from your mistakes. At least, most of us have been told so. But science shows that we often fail to learn from past errors. Instead, we are likely to keep repeating the same mistakes.</p> <p>What do I mean by mistakes here? I think we would all agree that we quickly learn that if we put our hand on a hot stove, for instance, we get burned, and so are unlikely to repeat this mistake again. That’s because our brains create a threat-response to the physically painful stimuli based on past experiences. But when it comes to thinking, behavioural patterns and decision making, we often repeat mistakes – such as being late for appointments, leaving tasks until the last moment or judging people based on first impressions.</p> <p>The reason can be found in the way our brain processes information and creates templates that we refer to again and again. These templates are essentially shortcuts, which help us make decisions in the real world. But these shortcuts, known as heuristics, can also make us repeat our errors.</p> <p>As I discuss in my book <a href="https://www.drpragyaagarwal.co.uk/sway-press">Sway: Unravelling Unconscious Bias</a>, humans are not naturally rational, even though we would like to believe that we are. Information overload is exhausting and confusing, so we filter out the noise.</p> <p>We only see parts of the world. We tend to notice things that are repeating, whether there are any patterns or not, and we tend to preserve memory by generalising and resorting to type. We also draw conclusions from sparse data and use cognitive shortcuts to create a version of reality that we implicitly want to believe in. This creates a reduced stream of incoming information, which helps us connect dots and fill in gaps with stuff we already know.</p> <p>Ultimately, our brains are lazy and it takes a lot of cognitive effort to change the script and these shortcuts that we have already built up. And so we are more likely to fall back on the same patterns of behaviours and actions, even when we are conscious of repeating our mistakes. This is called confirmation bias – our tendency to confirm what we already believe in, rather than shift our mindset to incorporate new information and ideas.</p> <p>We also often deploy “<a href="https://theconversation.com/is-it-rational-to-trust-your-gut-feelings-a-neuroscientist-explains-95086">gut instinct</a>” - an automatic, subconscious type of thinking that draws on our accumulation of past experiences while making judgements and decisions in new situations.</p> <p>Sometimes we stick with certain behaviour patterns, and repeat our mistakes because of an “<a href="https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0014292121002786">ego effect</a>” that compels us to stick with our existing beliefs. We are likely to selectively choose the information structures and feedback that help us protect our egos.</p> <p>One experiment found that when people were reminded of their successes of the past, they were more likely to <a href="https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S1057740815000728">repeat those successful behaviours</a>. But when they were conscious of or actively made aware of their failures from the past, they were less likely to overturn the pattern of behaviour that led to failure. So people were in fact still likely to repeat that behaviour.</p> <p>That’s because, when we think of our past failures, we are likely to feel down. And in those moments, we are more likely to indulge in behaviour that makes us feel comfortable and familiar. Even when we think carefully and slowly, our brains have a bias towards the information and templates we had used in the past, regardless of whether these resulted in errors. This is called the <a href="https://www.psychologytoday.com/gb/blog/mind-my-money/200807/familiarity-bias-part-i-what-is-it">familiarity bias</a>.</p> <p>We can learn from mistakes though. In one experiment, monkeys and humans had to watch noisy, moving dots on a screen and judge their net direction of movement. The researchers found that both slowed down after an error. The larger the error, the longer the post-error slowing, showing more information was being accumulated. However, the quality of this information <a href="https://www.eurekalert.org/news-releases/809286">was low</a>. Our cognitive shortcuts can force us to override any new information that could help prevent repeating mistakes.</p> <p>In fact, if we make mistakes while performing a certain task, “frequency bias” makes us likely to repeat them whenever we do the task again. Simplistically speaking, our brains start assuming that the errors we’ve previously made are the correct way to perform a task – creating a habitual <a href="https://link.springer.com/article/10.3758/pbr.15.1.156">“mistake pathway”</a>. So the more we repeat the same tasks, the more likely we are to traverse the mistake pathway, until it becomes so deeply embedded that it becomes a set of permanent cognitive shortcuts in our brains.</p> <p><strong>Cognitive control</strong></p> <p>It sounds bleak, so what can be done?</p> <p>We do have a mental ability that can override heuristic shortcuts, known as “cognitive control”. And there are some <a href="https://www.cell.com/neuron/fulltext/S0896-6273(21)00075-1">recent studies in neuroscience with mice</a> that are giving us a better idea of what parts of our brains are involved in that.</p> <p>Researchers have also <a href="https://www.cell.com/neuron/fulltext/S0896-6273(18)31007-9">identified two brain regions</a> with “self-error monitoring neurons” – brain cells which monitor errors. These areas are in the frontal cortex and appear to be part of a sequence of processing steps – from refocusing to learning from our mistakes.</p> <p>Researchers are exploring whether a better understanding of this could help with development of better treatments and support for Alzheimer’s, for example, as preserved cognitive control is crucial for <a href="https://www.frontiersin.org/articles/10.3389/fnagi.2020.00198/full">wellbeing in later life</a>.</p> <p>But even if we don’t have a perfect understanding of the brain processes involved in cognitive control and self-correction, there are simpler things we can do.</p> <p>One is to become more comfortable with making mistakes. We might think that this is the wrong attitude towards failures, but it is in fact a more positive way forward. Our society denigrates failures and mistakes, and consequently we are likely to feel shame for our mistakes, and try and hide them.</p> <p>The more guilty and ashamed we feel, and the more we try and hide our mistakes from others, the more likely we are to repeat them. When we not feeling so down about ourselves, we are more likely to be better at taking on new information that can help us correct our mistakes.</p> <p>It can also be a good idea to take a break from performing a task that we want to learn how to do better. Acknowledging our failures and pausing to consider them can help us reduce frequency bias, which will make us less likely to repeat our mistakes and reinforce the mistake pathways.</p> <p><em>Image credit: Shutterstock</em></p> <p><em>This article originally appeared on <a href="https://theconversation.com/how-the-brain-stops-us-learning-from-our-mistakes-and-what-to-do-about-it-203436" target="_blank" rel="noopener">The Conversation</a>. </em></p>

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What you can do to resist fake news

<p>Although the term itself is not new, fake news presents a growing threat for <a href="https://qz.com/africa/1473127/africas-fake-news-problem-is-worse-than-in-the-us/">societies across the world</a>.</p> <p>Only a <a href="https://journals.plos.org/plosone/article?id=10.1371/journal.pone.0207383" title="Information-theoretic models of deception: Modelling cooperation and diffusion in populations exposed to fake news">small amount of fake news is needed</a> to disrupt a conversation, and at extremes it can have an impact on democratic processes, <a href="https://theconversation.com/trump-may-owe-his-2016-victory-to-fake-news-new-study-suggests-91538">including elections</a>.</p> <p>But what can we do to avoid fake news, at a time when we could be waiting a while for <a href="https://en.unesco.org/fightfakenews" title="Journalism, Fake News and Disinformation: A Handbook for Journalism Education and Training">mainstream media</a> and <a href="https://www.cnbc.com/2018/11/08/fake-news-is-going-to-get-worse-unless-companies-take-action-dnc-cto.html">social networks</a> to step up and <a href="https://www.marketplace.org/2018/08/24/tech/one-problem-fake-news-it-really-really-works">address the problem</a>?</p> <p>From a psychology perspective, an important step in tackling fake news is to understand why it gets into our mind. We can do this by <a href="https://theconversation.com/why-two-people-see-the-same-thing-but-have-different-memories-104327">examining how memory works</a> and <a href="https://www.amazon.com/Memory-Distortion-Brains-Societies-Reconstruct/dp/0674566769">how memories become distorted</a>.</p> <p>Using this viewpoint generates some tips you can use to work out whether you’re reading or sharing fake news – which might be handy in the coming election period.</p> <p><strong>How memory gets distorted at the source</strong></p> <p>Fake news often relies on <a href="https://www.psychologytoday.com/us/articles/200105/the-seven-sins-memory">misattribution</a> – instances in which we can retrieve things from memory but can’t remember their source.</p> <p>Misattribution is one of the reasons advertising is so effective. We see a product and feel a pleasant sense of familiarity because we’ve encountered it before, but fail to remember that the source of the memory was an ad.</p> <p><a href="https://www.researchgate.net/profile/David_Rand2/publication/327866113_Prior_Exposure_Increases_Perceived_Accuracy_of_Fake_News/" title="Prior Exposure Increases Perceived Accuracy of Fake News">One study</a> examined headlines from fake news published during the 2016 US Presidential Election.</p> <p>The researchers found even one presentation of a headline (such as “Donald Trump Sent His Own Plane to Transport 200 Stranded Marines”, <a href="https://www.snopes.com/fact-check/donald-trumps-marine-airlift/">based on claims shown to be false</a>) was enough to increase belief in its content. This effect persisted for at least a week, was still found when headlines were accompanied by a factcheck warning, and even when participants suspected it might be false.</p> <p>Repeated exposure can <a href="https://www.vox.com/science-and-health/2017/10/5/16410912/illusory-truth-fake-news-las-vegas-google-facebook">increase the sense that misinformation is true</a>. Repetition creates the perception of group consensus that can result in collective misremembering, a phenomenon called the <a href="https://theconversation.com/the-mandela-effect-and-how-your-mind-is-playing-tricks-on-you-89544">Mandela Effect</a>.</p> <p>It might be harmless when people collectively misremember something fun, such as a <a href="https://www.buzzfeed.com/christopherhudspeth/crazy-examples-of-the-mandela-effect-that-will-make-you-ques">childhood cartoon (did the Queen in Disney’s Snow White really NOT say “Mirror, mirror…”?)</a>. But it has serious consequences when a false sense of group consensus contributes to <a href="https://www.abc.net.au/radio/programs/the-signal/are-anti-vaxxers-having-a-moment/10957310">rising outbreaks of measles</a>.</p> <p>Scientists have investigated whether <a href="https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/full/10.1002/acp.3274" title="Public Attitudes on the Ethics of Deceptively Planting False Memories to Motivate Healthy Behavior">targeted misinformation can promote healthy behaviour</a>. Dubbed false-memory diets, it is said that false memories of food experiences can encourage people to <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2005/12/11/magazine/falsememory-diet-the.html">avoid fatty foods</a>, <a href="https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3627832/" title="Queasy does it: False alcohol beliefs and memories may lead to diminished alcohol preferences">alcohol</a> and even <a href="https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/25116296" title="Asparagus, a love story: healthier eating could be just a false memory away">convince them to love asparagus</a>.</p> <p>Creative people that have a strong ability to associate different words are <a href="https://www.researchgate.net/profile/Thomas_Ormerod/publication/251531367_Convergent_but_not_divergent_thinking_predicts_susceptibility_to_associative_memory_illusions/" title="Convergent, but not divergent, thinking predicts susceptibility to associative memory illusions">especially susceptible to false memories</a>. Some people might be more vulnerable than others to believe fake news, but <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2016/12/24/world/asia/pakistan-israel-khawaja-asif-fake-news-nuclear.html">everyone is at risk</a>.</p> <p><strong>How bias can reinforce fake news</strong></p> <p><a href="https://www.psychologytoday.com/us/articles/200105/the-seven-sins-memory">Bias</a> is how our feelings and worldview affect the <a href="https://theconversation.com/why-two-people-see-the-same-thing-but-have-different-memories-104327">encoding and retrieval of memory</a>. We might like to think of our memory as an archivist that carefully preserves events, but <a href="https://www.taylorfrancis.com/books/e/9781351660020/chapters/10.4324/9781315159591-4" title="New Directions in the Philosophy of Memory">sometimes it’s more like a storyteller</a>. Memories are shaped by our beliefs and can function to <a href="https://www.sciencedirect.com/topics/neuroscience/autobiographical-memory">maintain a consistent narrative rather than an accurate record</a>.</p> <p>An example of this is selective exposure, our tendency to seek information that <a href="https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4797953/" title="Feeling Validated Versus Being Correct: A Meta-Analysis of Selective Exposure to Information">reinforces our pre-existing beliefs</a> and to avoid information that brings those beliefs into question. This effect is supported by evidence that television news audiences are <a href="https://www.journalism.org/2014/10/21/political-polarization-media-habits/">overwhelmingly partisan</a> and exist in their own echo chambers.</p> <p>It was thought that online communities exhibit the same behaviour, contributing to the spread of fake news, but this <a href="https://theconversation.com/the-myth-of-the-echo-chamber-92544">appears to be a myth</a>. Political news sites are often populated by people with <a href="https://www.academia.edu/34506137/The_Myth_of_Partisan_Selective_Exposure_A_Portrait_of_the_Online_Political_News_Audience">diverse ideological backgrounds</a> and echo chambers are <a href="https://medium.com/trust-media-and-democracy/avoiding-the-echo-chamber-about-echo-chambers-6e1f1a1a0f39">more likely to exist in real life than online</a>.</p> <p>Our brains are wired to assume things we believe <a href="https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/abs/10.1177/0146167203259933" title="Evolving Informational Credentials: The (Mis)Attribution of Believable Facts to Credible Sources">originated from a credible source</a>. But are we more inclined to remember information that reinforces our beliefs? <a href="https://www.researchgate.net/publication/247781236_Do_Attitudes_Affect_Memory_Tests_of_the_Congeniality_Hypothesis" title="Do Attitudes Affect Memory? Tests of the Congeniality Hypothesis">This is probably not the case</a>.</p> <p>People who hold strong beliefs remember things that are relevant to their beliefs but they remember opposing information too. This happens because people are motivated to defend their beliefs against opposing views.</p> <p>Belief echoes are a related phenomenon that <a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/why-correcting-donald-trump--or-anyone-else--doesnt-work/2016/01/08/9e5ef5d4-b57d-11e5-a842-0feb51d1d124_story.html?utm_term=.912e5b8e4409">highlight the difficulty of correcting misinformation</a>. Fake news is often designed to be attention-grabbing.</p> <p>It can continue to shape people’s attitudes after it has been discredited because it produces a vivid emotional reaction and builds on our existing narratives.</p> <p>Corrections have a much smaller emotional impact, especially if they require policy details, so should be <a href="https://www.researchgate.net/publication/258180567_Misinformation_and_Its_Correction_Continued_Influence_and_Successful_Debiasing" title="Misinformation and Its Correction Continued Influence and Successful Debiasing">designed to satisfy a similar narrative urge</a> to be effective.</p> <p><strong>Tips for resisting fake news</strong></p> <p>The way our memory works means it might be impossible to resist fake news completely.</p> <p>But one approach is to start <a href="https://qz.com/858887/how-to-know-if-fake-news-is-fake-learn-to-think-like-a-scientist/">thinking like a scientist</a>. This involves adopting a questioning attitude that is motivated by curiosity, and being aware of personal bias.</p> <p>For fake news, this might involve asking ourselves the following questions:</p> <ul> <li> <p><strong>What type of content is this?</strong> <a href="https://theconversation.com/australians-born-overseas-prefer-the-online-world-for-their-news-84355">Many people rely on social media and aggregators as their main source of news</a>. By reflecting on whether information is news, opinion or even humour, this can help consolidate information more completely into memory.</p> </li> <li> <p><strong>Where is it published?</strong> Paying attention to where information is published is crucial for encoding the source of information into memory. If something is a big deal, a wide variety of sources will discuss it, so attending to this detail is important.</p> </li> <li> <p><strong>Who benefits?</strong> Reflecting on who benefits from you believing the content helps consolidate the source of that information into memory. It can also help us reflect on our own interests and whether our personal biases are at play.</p> </li> </ul> <p>Some people <a href="https://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=3023545" title="Who Falls for Fake News? The Roles of Bullshit Receptivity, Overclaiming, Familiarity, and Analytic Thinking">tend to be more susceptible to fake news</a> because they are more accepting of weak claims.</p> <p>But we can strive to be more reflective in our open-mindedness by paying attention to the source of information, and questioning our own knowledge if and when we are unable to remember the context of our memories.<!-- Below is The Conversation's page counter tag. Please DO NOT REMOVE. --><img style="border: none !important; box-shadow: none !important; margin: 0 !important; max-height: 1px !important; max-width: 1px !important; min-height: 1px !important; min-width: 1px !important; opacity: 0 !important; outline: none !important; padding: 0 !important; text-shadow: none !important;" src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/114921/count.gif?distributor=republish-lightbox-basic" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" /><!-- End of code. If you don't see any code above, please get new code from the Advanced tab after you click the republish button. The page counter does not collect any personal data. More info: http://theconversation.com/republishing-guidelines --></p> <p><em>Written by <span>Julian Matthews, Research Officer - Cognitive Neurology Lab, Monash University</span>. Republished with permission of </em><a rel="noopener" href="https://theconversation.com/how-fake-news-gets-into-our-minds-and-what-you-can-do-to-resist-it-114921" target="_blank"><em>The Conversation</em></a><em>. </em></p>

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