<p>Adding <a href="https://cogsci.stackexchange.com/a/118/21">to what shanusmagnus said</a>: What you refer to is indeed an established psychological phenomenon called <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Confirmation_bias" rel="nofollow noreferrer">Confirmation Bias</a>. The bias consists of </p>

<blockquote>
  <p>the seeking or interpreting of evidence in ways that are partial to
  existing beliefs, expectations, or a hypothesis in hand (Nickerson,
  1998).</p>
</blockquote>

<p>Confirmation Bias apparently is among the most studied biases in psychology (Mercier &amp; Sperber, 2011), and there is a lot of evidence for its existence (for a review see Nickerson, 1998). Mercier and Sperber (2011) also state that</p>

<blockquote>
  <p>While there is some individual variation, it seems that everybody is
  affected by some degree, irrespective of factors like general
  intelligence or open mindedness (Stanovich &amp; West, 2007; 2008a; 2008b)</p>
</blockquote>

<p>I also remember reading an interview with Hugo Mercier, in which he said that all attempts at training people to get rid of their Confirmation Bias have been unsuccessful, but I don't have any citations to back this up.</p>

<p>Mercier and Sperber (2011) recently formulated a theory called the Argumentative Theory, which is <a href="https://cogsci.stackexchange.com/a/118/21">in line with what shanusmagnus said</a>, namely that Confirmation Bias may be a feature rather than a flaw. In their Argumentative Theory Mercier and Sperber argue that reasoning may have developed not in order to be best suited for solving problems, but rather to convince others in discourse. They argue from an evolutionary point of view that the capability of doing so provides an evolutionary advantage.</p>

<p><sub>
Mercier, Hugo, und Dan Sperber. <a href="http://dx.doi.org/10.1017/S0140525X10000968" rel="nofollow noreferrer">Why do humans reason? Arguments for an argumentative theory.</a> <em>Behavioral and Brain Sciences</em> 34, Nr. 2 (April 2011): 57–74.<br>
Nickerson, R. S. <a href="http://dx.doi.org/10.1037/1089-2680.2.2.175" rel="nofollow noreferrer">Confirmation bias: A ubiquitous phenomenon in many guises.</a> Review of General Psychology; Review of General Psychology 2, Nr. 2 (1998): 175.<br>
Stanovich, K. E., und R. F. West. <a href="http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/13546780600780796" rel="nofollow noreferrer">Natural myside bias is independent of cognitive ability.</a> <em>Thinking &amp; Reasoning</em> 13, Nr. 3 (2007): 225–247.<br>
Stanovich, K. E., und R. F. West. <a href="http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/13546780701679764" rel="nofollow noreferrer">On the failure of cognitive ability to predict myside and one-sided thinking biases.</a> <em>Thinking &amp; Reasoning</em> 14, Nr. 2 (2008): 129–167.<br>
Stanovich, K. E., und R. F. West. <a href="http://dx.doi.org/10.1037/0022-3514.94.4.672" rel="nofollow noreferrer">On the relative independence of thinking biases and cognitive ability.</a> <em>Journal of personality and social psychology</em> 94, Nr. 4 (2008): 672.
</sub></p>

CC BY-SA 3.0
2012-05-13T14:29:18.263Z
2012-05-13T16:08:46.790Z
2017-04-13T12:56:16.417Z
Jens Kouros
<p>A possibly relevant take on this question is provided by a computational model described in [1]. Although the main thrust of the paper is that selfish agents, by being habitual (sticking with their choices), contribute to The Common Good (in spite of themselves, so to speak), the argument is also made that habituation increases individual fitness.</p>

<p><strong>References:</strong></p>

<p>[1] Davies, A. P., Watson, R. A., Mills, R., Buckley, C. L., &amp; Noble, J. (2011). “If You Can’t Be With the One You Love, Love the One You’re With”: How   Individual Habituation of Agent Interactions Improves Global Utility. Artificial Life, 17(3), 167–181. <a href="http://core.kmi.open.ac.uk/display/1511986">Link</a></p>

CC BY-SA 3.0
2012-05-21T15:04:07.097Z
2012-05-21T15:04:07.097Z
Peter Helfer
<p>Relevant entries from Wikipedia's <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_cognitive_biases">list of cognitive biases</a>:</p>

<ul>
<li><a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Backfire_effect">Backfire effect</a> - when people react to disconfirming evidence by strengthening their beliefs.</li>
<li><a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Confirmation_bias">Confirmation bias</a> - the tendency to search for or interpret information in a way that confirms one's preconceptions.</li>
<li><a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Irrational_escalation">Irrational escalation</a> [or Escalation of commitment] – the phenomenon where people justify increased investment in a decision, based on the cumulative prior investment, despite new evidence suggesting that the decision was probably wrong.</li>
</ul>

CC BY-SA 3.0
2012-06-01T05:02:02.460Z
2012-06-01T05:02:02.460Z
John Pick
<p>Yes.  But why should it be so?  One can approach the question from a number of directions. For instance, Cass Sunstein <a href="http://www.jstor.org/pss/1290382">talks about</a> how information cascades can create the path-dependent effects you describe: person A says something, which steers person B toward the same opinion, with the result that group decision-making heavily overvalues inputs of early responders.  (James Surowiecki also did an excellent <a href="http://rads.stackoverflow.com/amzn/click/0385721706">popular science treatment</a> of this topic.)</p>

<p>So much for the <a href="http://www.bartleby.com/100/420.47.html">hobgoblin of little minds</a> for groups.  Within the individual, the topic has been addressed through the dissonance literature, in which cogitation contrary to an established position carries unpleasant consequences, both <a href="http://books.google.com/books?hl=en&amp;lr=&amp;id=mGciFLxz588C&amp;oi=fnd&amp;pg=PA237&amp;dq=The+role+of+affect+in+cognitive+dissonance+processes&amp;ots=DgArzZPSd9&amp;sig=Mk8SERoM-x2leZCh0RnjpTRWRZc#v=onepage&amp;q=The%20role%20of%20affect%20in%20cognitive%20dissonance%20processes&amp;f=false">hedonic</a> and adaptive.  Particularly, maintaining a consistent set of mental beliefs seems to be important for efficient <a href="http://www.socialemotiveneuroscience.org/pubs/hj_hj2002pspb.pdf">action selection</a>, possibly as a consequence of the way semantic information (including motor control programs) is <a href="http://www.psych.mcgill.ca/perpg/fac/shultz/personal/Recent_Publications_files/diss96.pdf">represented in the brain.</a></p>

<p>The result of all this is that, as you suggest, people establish a position, and then are motivated to keep it, which is not news.  What is surprising is that this annoying behavior is probably highly adaptive and a consequence of our neural architecture for knowledge representation and decision-making.  In other words, a feature and not a bug.</p>

CC BY-SA 3.0
2012-01-21T16:57:01.020Z
Thank you! I feel this answered my question, but it raises several spin-off questions which I might ask later. However, I don't see how the first paragraph is an answer to my question, and would probably change that to additional information at the end instead of starting with it.
Steven Jeuris
CC BY-SA 3.0
2012-01-21T18:11:01.107Z
My motivation in the first para is that consistency with established opinion is an issue at multiple levels: at the level of the individual, and also the level of the group; although perhaps, as you say, it would be more intuitive to lead in with the latter and then point out the former.  Also, if you like the answer, consider marking it the 'accepted' answer if there are no others you prefer.
shanusmagnus
CC BY-SA 4.0
2018-08-15T10:43:06.873Z
I am currently reading this highly related paper which sheds a lot of light on the 'why' part of this question (which by all means should be considered a spin-off question). Super interesting read! Mercier, H., & Sperber, D. (2011). [Why do humans reason? Arguments for an argumentative theory.](https://hal.archives-ouvertes.fr/hal-00904097/document) Behavioral and brain sciences, 34(2), 57-74.
Steven Jeuris
CC BY-SA 3.0
2012-01-21T16:24:43.527Z
2012-01-21T16:24:43.527Z
shanusmagnus
<p>Scytale's assessment, from the science fiction novel "<a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dune_Messiah" rel="nofollow noreferrer">Dune Messiah</a>" (1969)</p>

<blockquote>
  <p>When a creature has developed into one thing, he will choose death
  rather than change into his opposite.</p>
</blockquote>

<p>While reading some discussions on <a href="https://meta.stackoverflow.com/">Meta Stack Overflow</a>, it dawned on me that it might not be the best format to start constructive discussions. Once people pick sides in a discussion, they have a very high tendency to stop approaching the discussion from the other angle. People will dislike certain parts of a proposal, and then become vehemently against the entire thing, instead of trying to participate in resolving the issues they raise.</p>

<p>Is this an established psychological phenomenon?</p>

CC BY-SA 3.0
2012-02-13T13:16:46.447Z
I would prefer for questions like this to be re-scoped. I'll copy my comments from a [Meta thread](http://meta.cogsci.stackexchange.com/questions/175/reopen-request-can-an-average-person-be-involuntarily-hypnotised/176#comment348_176) over here. There are many ways this question could be interpreted. Everyone knows that ego often interferes with logic, so it is obviously a psychological phenomenom. The real question has to be something other.
Casebash
CC BY-SA 3.0
2012-02-13T13:23:00.430Z
@Casebash: I did not mention ego. I described how having an opinion about one part of a grander opinion has an effect on the grander opinion as a whole, instead of just the one part of it you dislike. [shanusmagnus's reference to dissonance literature](http://cogsci.stackexchange.com/a/118/21) answers this aspect of what I described very accurately. _"maintaining a consistent set of mental beliefs seems to be important for efficient action selection"_.
Steven Jeuris
CC BY-SA 3.0
2012-02-13T13:24:37.267Z
So is it about the strength of this tendency? Is it about what are the most common motivations for someone to ignore logical arguments? Is it about how a negative opinion of one part of a proposal affects someone's opinion of another part? Is it about how declaring one's side (such as in an argument) affect the persons' tendency to change their opinion as opposed to being given extra information about the opposite view in another manner? Is it about the logical fallacies that people use to maintain cognative dissonance? Despite all this ambiguity, it has quite a good answer. Interesting.
Casebash
CC BY-SA 3.0
2012-02-13T13:30:09.257Z
@StevenJeuris: Yeh, I suggested that it could have been about ego on meta, but after rereading, I decided not to include to that here as an ambiguity. I only used it to demonstrate that an effect of some sort that makes people stick to opinion's with logical reasons, clearly exists.
Casebash
CC BY-SA 3.0
2012-01-21T15:48:52.737Z
Help us establish the scope of this site, is this question too basic? [Join the discussion on meta](http://meta.cogsci.stackexchange.com/questions/13/whats-too-basic-or-general-reference-for-this-site)!
Steven Jeuris
CC BY-SA 3.0
2012-01-21T18:17:21.953Z
Is this related to the concept of maximizers (people who obsess over a decision) and satisficers? It sounds similar to me.
Thomas Owens
CC BY-SA 3.0
2012-01-21T18:46:59.847Z
Related is the [Baby Duck Syndrome](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Baby_duck_syndrome)
Zelda
CC BY-SA 3.0
2012-01-22T02:10:38.787Z
@ThomasOwens: [Satisficing](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Satisficer) seems to be related to decision making, but from what I read doesn't consider the disposition to prefer ideas you started out with. [shanusmagnus's reference to dissonance literature](http://cogsci.stackexchange.com/a/118/21) reflects this much better.
Steven Jeuris
<terminology><social-psychology>
Do people have a tendency to stick to one opinion after they formed it?
Steven Jeuris
# Do people have a tendency to stick to one opinion after they formed it?

(Asked by: username_0 on 2012-01-21)

Scytale's assessment, from the science fiction novel "[Dune Messiah](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dune_Messiah)" (1969)

> When a creature has developed into one thing, he will choose death
> rather than change into his opposite.

While reading some discussions on [Meta Stack Overflow](https://meta.stackoverflow.com/), it dawned on me that it might not be the best format to start constructive discussions. Once people pick sides in a discussion, they have a very high tendency to stop approaching the discussion from the other angle. People will dislike certain parts of a proposal, and then become vehemently against the entire thing, instead of trying to participate in resolving the issues they raise.

Is this an established psychological phenomenon?

**Tags:** terminology, social-psychology

> **Comments:**
> **username_0**: Help us establish the scope of this site, is this question too basic? [Join the discussion on meta](http://meta.cogsci.stackexchange.com/questions/13/whats-too-basic-or-general-reference-for-this-site)!  
> **username_2**: Is this related to the concept of maximizers (people who obsess over a decision) and satisficers? It sounds similar to me.  
> **username_3**: Related is the [Baby Duck Syndrome](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Baby_duck_syndrome)  
> **username_0**: @ThomasOwens: [Satisficing](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Satisficer) seems to be related to decision making, but from what I read doesn't consider the disposition to prefer ideas you started out with. [username_7's reference to dissonance literature](http://cogsci.stackexchange.com/a/118/21) reflects this much better.  
> **username_1**: I would prefer for questions like this to be re-scoped. I'll copy my comments from a [Meta thread](http://meta.cogsci.stackexchange.com/questions/175/reopen-request-can-an-average-person-be-involuntarily-hypnotised/176#comment348_176) over here. There are many ways this question could be interpreted. Everyone knows that ego often interferes with logic, so it is obviously a psychological phenomenom. The real question has to be something other.  
> **username_0**: @username_1: I did not mention ego. I described how having an opinion about one part of a grander opinion has an effect on the grander opinion as a whole, instead of just the one part of it you dislike. [username_7's reference to dissonance literature](http://cogsci.stackexchange.com/a/118/21) answers this aspect of what I described very accurately. _"maintaining a consistent set of mental beliefs seems to be important for efficient action selection"_.  
> **username_1**: So is it about the strength of this tendency? Is it about what are the most common motivations for someone to ignore logical arguments? Is it about how a negative opinion of one part of a proposal affects someone's opinion of another part? Is it about how declaring one's side (such as in an argument) affect the persons' tendency to change their opinion as opposed to being given extra information about the opposite view in another manner? Is it about the logical fallacies that people use to maintain cognative dissonance? Despite all this ambiguity, it has quite a good answer. Interesting.  
> **username_1**: @StevenJeuris: Yeh, I suggested that it could have been about ego on meta, but after rereading, I decided not to include to that here as an ambiguity. I only used it to demonstrate that an effect of some sort that makes people stick to opinion's with logical reasons, clearly exists.  

---

## 4 answers

### Answer by username_7 on 2012-01-21. Score: 17 | Accepted answer

Yes. But why should it be so? One can approach the question from a number of directions. For instance, Cass Sunstein [talks about](http://www.jstor.org/pss/1290382) how information cascades can create the path-dependent effects you describe: person A says something, which steers person B toward the same opinion, with the result that group decision-making heavily overvalues inputs of early responders. (James Surowiecki also did an excellent [popular science treatment](http://rads.stackoverflow.com/amzn/click/0385721706) of this topic.)

So much for the [hobgoblin of little minds](http://www.bartleby.com/100/420.47.html) for groups. Within the individual, the topic has been addressed through the dissonance literature, in which cogitation contrary to an established position carries unpleasant consequences, both [hedonic](http://books.google.com/books?hl=en&lr=&id=mGciFLxz588C&oi=fnd&pg=PA237&dq=The+role+of+affect+in+cognitive+dissonance+processes&ots=DgArzZPSd9&sig=Mk8SERoM-x2leZCh0RnjpTRWRZc#v=onepage&q=The%20role%20of%20affect%20in%20cognitive%20dissonance%20processes&f=false) and adaptive. Particularly, maintaining a consistent set of mental beliefs seems to be important for efficient [action selection](http://www.socialemotiveneuroscience.org/pubs/hj_hj2002pspb.pdf), possibly as a consequence of the way semantic information (including motor control programs) is [represented in the brain.](http://www.psych.mcgill.ca/perpg/fac/shultz/personal/Recent_Publications_files/diss96.pdf)

The result of all this is that, as you suggest, people establish a position, and then are motivated to keep it, which is not news. What is surprising is that this annoying behavior is probably highly adaptive and a consequence of our neural architecture for knowledge representation and decision-making. In other words, a feature and not a bug.

> **Comments:**
> **username_0**: Thank you! I feel this answered my question, but it raises several spin-off questions which I might ask later. However, I don't see how the first paragraph is an answer to my question, and would probably change that to additional information at the end instead of starting with it.  
> **username_7**: My motivation in the first para is that consistency with established opinion is an issue at multiple levels: at the level of the individual, and also the level of the group; although perhaps, as you say, it would be more intuitive to lead in with the latter and then point out the former.  Also, if you like the answer, consider marking it the 'accepted' answer if there are no others you prefer.  
> **username_0**: I am currently reading this highly related paper which sheds a lot of light on the 'why' part of this question (which by all means should be considered a spin-off question). Super interesting read! Mercier, H., & Sperber, D. (2011). [Why do humans reason? Arguments for an argumentative theory.](https://hal.archives-ouvertes.fr/hal-00904097/document) Behavioral and brain sciences, 34(2), 57-74.  

---

### Answer by username_4 on 2012-05-13. Score: 14

Adding [to what username_7 said](https://cogsci.stackexchange.com/a/118/21): What you refer to is indeed an established psychological phenomenon called [Confirmation Bias](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Confirmation_bias). The bias consists of

> the seeking or interpreting of evidence in ways that are partial to
> existing beliefs, expectations, or a hypothesis in hand (Nickerson,
> 1998).

Confirmation Bias apparently is among the most studied biases in psychology (Mercier & Sperber, 2011), and there is a lot of evidence for its existence (for a review see Nickerson, 1998). Mercier and Sperber (2011) also state that

> While there is some individual variation, it seems that everybody is
> affected by some degree, irrespective of factors like general
> intelligence or open mindedness (Stanovich & West, 2007; 2008a; 2008b)

I also remember reading an interview with Hugo Mercier, in which he said that all attempts at training people to get rid of their Confirmation Bias have been unsuccessful, but I don't have any citations to back this up.

Mercier and Sperber (2011) recently formulated a theory called the Argumentative Theory, which is [in line with what username_7 said](https://cogsci.stackexchange.com/a/118/21), namely that Confirmation Bias may be a feature rather than a flaw. In their Argumentative Theory Mercier and Sperber argue that reasoning may have developed not in order to be best suited for solving problems, but rather to convince others in discourse. They argue from an evolutionary point of view that the capability of doing so provides an evolutionary advantage.

Mercier, Hugo, und Dan Sperber. [Why do humans reason? Arguments for an argumentative theory.](http://dx.doi.org/10.1017/S0140525X10000968) *Behavioral and Brain Sciences* 34, Nr. 2 (April 2011): 57–74.  
Nickerson, R. S. [Confirmation bias: A ubiquitous phenomenon in many guises.](http://dx.doi.org/10.1037/1089-2680.2.2.175) Review of General Psychology; Review of General Psychology 2, Nr. 2 (1998): 175.  
Stanovich, K. E., und R. F. West. [Natural myside bias is independent of cognitive ability.](http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/13546780600780796) *Thinking & Reasoning* 13, Nr. 3 (2007): 225–247.  
Stanovich, K. E., und R. F. West. [On the failure of cognitive ability to predict myside and one-sided thinking biases.](http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/13546780701679764) *Thinking & Reasoning* 14, Nr. 2 (2008): 129–167.  
Stanovich, K. E., und R. F. West. [On the relative independence of thinking biases and cognitive ability.](http://dx.doi.org/10.1037/0022-3514.94.4.672) *Journal of personality and social psychology* 94, Nr. 4 (2008): 672.


---

### Answer by username_5 on 2012-05-21. Score: 6

A possibly relevant take on this question is provided by a computational model described in [1]. Although the main thrust of the paper is that selfish agents, by being habitual (sticking with their choices), contribute to The Common Good (in spite of themselves, so to speak), the argument is also made that habituation increases individual fitness.

**References:**

[1] Davies, A. P., Watson, R. A., Mills, R., Buckley, C. L., & Noble, J. (2011). “If You Can’t Be With the One You Love, Love the One You’re With”: How Individual Habituation of Agent Interactions Improves Global Utility. Artificial Life, 17(3), 167–181. [Link](http://core.kmi.open.ac.uk/display/1511986)


---

### Answer by username_6 on 2012-06-01. Score: 5

Relevant entries from Wikipedia's [list of cognitive biases](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_cognitive_biases):

* [Backfire effect](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Backfire_effect) - when people react to disconfirming evidence by strengthening their beliefs.
* [Confirmation bias](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Confirmation_bias) - the tendency to search for or interpret information in a way that confirms one's preconceptions.
* [Irrational escalation](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Irrational_escalation) [or Escalation of commitment] – the phenomenon where people justify increased investment in a decision, based on the cumulative prior investment, despite new evidence suggesting that the decision was probably wrong.


---

