PsychologicalDUAL-USE

Information Bias

What it is

People seek and value information even when no possible result could change what they will do — and persuaders use the appetite either to delay action (“more research is needed”) or to manufacture a feeling of diligence around a decision the information cannot inform.

How it works

Baron, Beattie and Hershey showed in 1988 that people want diagnostic tests even when no possible result would change the treatment: given a case where the best therapy was the same whatever the test showed, participants still valued the test highly. The tendency, which Baron called information bias, arises because information feels like progress and because certainty is pleasant even when it is not useful; the question “would any answer change what I do?” is rarely asked. A second strand compounds it. Oskamp found in 1965 that as clinicians received more case material, their confidence in their judgments rose steadily while their accuracy did not, so extra information purchases assurance rather than accuracy. The persuasion uses are two. One is delay: “we need more data,” “a review is under way,” “more research is needed” hold off an action whose expected value is already clear, and the manufactured-doubt playbook depends on the audience treating a call for information as neutral. The other is pseudo-diligence: sellers bury a decision in reports, dashboards and consultations that cannot change the answer but leave the buyer feeling thorough, and the felt thoroughness is then mistaken for a good decision.

Real-world examples

  • •In Baron, Beattie and Hershey's scenarios, participants asked for a test to distinguish two diseases even when both were treated identically, and rated the test as valuable.
  • •Tobacco companies funded and publicised calls for “more research” from the 1950s onward; internal documents released in litigation show the purpose was to defer regulation, not to resolve a question the companies believed was open.
  • •Governments across the spectrum announce commissions, reviews and consultations on issues they do not intend to act on; the British phrase “kicking it into the long grass” names the manoeuvre.
  • •The Choosing Wisely campaign, launched by the American Board of Internal Medicine Foundation in 2012, lists tests and procedures that specialty societies themselves identify as unlikely to change management.
  • •Enterprise sales cycles offer free assessments, maturity audits and benchmark reports whose results could not change whether the product is needed but which make the eventual purchase feel investigated.

Ethical guidelines

Where the line is

Asking for information that could change a decision is diligence; demanding information that cannot change it in order to delay, to appear thorough, or to leave the other party feeling more certain than the evidence warrants is manipulation of the appetite for knowing.

  • ●Before requesting information from a decision-maker, state what result would change the decision and how; if no result would, do not request it.
  • ●Do not call for more research or a review as a way of delaying an action you would oppose whatever the research found.
  • ●Do not use reports, audits and data volume to manufacture a feeling of diligence around a decision the information cannot inform.

How to defend against it

  • ►Ask the Baron question of every proposed test, report or consultation: is there any result that would change what I do? If not, decline it and decide.
  • ►Set the decision threshold first: write down what evidence would be enough to act, then gather only that. Information collected without a threshold produces confidence, not accuracy.
  • ►When someone says more research is needed, ask what specific finding would satisfy them and when it is expected; an answer without a finding or a date is delay wearing a lab coat.
  • ►Time-box due diligence and notice when you are collecting information to feel thorough rather than to choose; the feeling is the product being sold.

References

  1. Baron, J., Beattie, J., & Hershey, J. C. (1988). Heuristics and biases in diagnostic reasoning: II. Congruence, information, and certainty. Organizational Behavior and Human Decision Processes, 42(1), 88-110
    The founding demonstration that people value tests whose results could not change the treatment decision.
  2. Baron, J. (2008). Thinking and Deciding (4th ed.). Cambridge University Press
    The textbook treatment naming and situating information bias among decision biases.
  3. Oskamp, S. (1965). Overconfidence in case-study judgments. Journal of Consulting Psychology, 29(3), 261-265
    Clinicians' confidence rose with additional case information while accuracy did not.
  4. Oreskes, N., & Conway, E. M. (2010). Merchants of Doubt: How a Handful of Scientists Obscured the Truth on Issues from Tobacco Smoke to Global Warming. Bloomsbury Press
    The use of calls for more research as a strategy to defer regulation, from tobacco onward.
Last reviewed
Suggest a correction

Detect Information Bias in any text

Paste any message, email, or article into our free Manipulation Detector to see if Information Bias or other techniques are being used on you.

Try the Detector FreeCreate Free Account