Anchoring is a cognitive bias referring to the fact that individuals choosing numeric values are influenced by momentarily present information, without being aware of it. It describes the common tendency to rely on the first piece of information offered when making decisions. Anchors can be eternally provided or self generated. The broad idea of anchoring can be seen through a quality seen in goslings. Dan Ariely’s describes in his book, Predictable Irrationality, that, “goslings, upon breaking out of their eggs, become attached to the first moving object they encounter… goslings make initial decisions based on what’s available in their environment,” (Ariely, 25). This phenomenon is a perfect example of how one can be affected by their environment
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I chose this experiment because I wanted to investigate if those introduced to lower numbers before answering, would give answers containing lower numbers. Likewise, I wanted to see if those shown high numbers would use higher numbers in their answers. To test my theory, I picked five individuals who could be recognized but who’s birth years were not common knowledge. I chose JFK (1917), Napoleon (1769), Amelia Earhart (1897), Thomas Edison (1847), and Julius Caesar (100). Next, I made two sets of cards: three high number cards (7,8,9) and three low number cards (1,2,3). I then selected ten individuals, ranging in age and gender, to participate in my experiment. To test my theory, I showed each individual either the high cards or low cards before asking them the birth year of each person on my list and then recorded their responses. Using the given anchors and individual’s responses, I attempted to find a correlation between the high or low anchor and numbers used in one’s …show more content…
First, even though these exact years are unknown to many people, by using historical context or one’s own knowledge, individuals can form an answer completely unrelated to the given anchors. For example, because one can infer that Julius Caesar lived a very long time ago, many of the answers for his birth year were very low- no matter the given anchor. However, this means that the effects of anchors can be seen more clearly when one does not know the answer. For example, when asked what year Amelia Earhart was born in, many people did not know and thus referred back to the given anchors. Eight out the ten responses for Amelia Earhart’s birth year were affected by one of the anchors. However, even though some results seen in this experiment could have been effected by outside factors, the effect of anchors remains
I chose this experiment because I wanted to investigate if those introduced to lower numbers before answering, would give answers containing lower numbers. Likewise, I wanted to see if those shown high numbers would use higher numbers in their answers. To test my theory, I picked five individuals who could be recognized but who’s birth years were not common knowledge. I chose JFK (1917), Napoleon (1769), Amelia Earhart (1897), Thomas Edison (1847), and Julius Caesar (100). Next, I made two sets of cards: three high number cards (7,8,9) and three low number cards (1,2,3). I then selected ten individuals, ranging in age and gender, to participate in my experiment. To test my theory, I showed each individual either the high cards or low cards before asking them the birth year of each person on my list and then recorded their responses. Using the given anchors and individual’s responses, I attempted to find a correlation between the high or low anchor and numbers used in one’s …show more content…
First, even though these exact years are unknown to many people, by using historical context or one’s own knowledge, individuals can form an answer completely unrelated to the given anchors. For example, because one can infer that Julius Caesar lived a very long time ago, many of the answers for his birth year were very low- no matter the given anchor. However, this means that the effects of anchors can be seen more clearly when one does not know the answer. For example, when asked what year Amelia Earhart was born in, many people did not know and thus referred back to the given anchors. Eight out the ten responses for Amelia Earhart’s birth year were affected by one of the anchors. However, even though some results seen in this experiment could have been effected by outside factors, the effect of anchors remains