Hindsight Bias: A Primer for Motivational Researchers

Social and Personality Psychology Compass

Volumn 5, Issue 9, 2011, Pages 665-678

  Pezzo, Mark V ^a  

^a UNIVERSITY OF SOUTH FLORIDA   (United States)

Author keywords

[No Author keywords available]

Indexed keywords

EID: 80052578876     PISSN: None     EISSN: 17519004     Source Type: Journal    
DOI: 10.1111/j.1751-9004.2011.00381.x     Document Type: Article

References (97)

1. Agrawal, N., & Maheswaran, D. (2005). Motivated reasoning in outcome-biased effects. Journal of Consumer Research, 31, 798-805.
2. Alicke, M. D., Davis, T. L., & Pezzo, M. V. (1994). A posteriori adjustment of a priori decision criteria. Social Cognition, 12, 281-308.
3. Anderson, J. C., Jennings, M. M., Lowe, D. J., & Reckers, P. M. J. (1997). The mitigation of hindsight bias in judges' evaluation of auditor decisions. Auditing: A Journal of Practice & Theory, 16, 20-40.
4. Arkes, H. R., & Schipani, C. A. (1994). Medical malpractice and the business judgment rule: Differences in hindsight bias. Oregon Law Review, 73, 587-638.
5. Arkes, H. R., Wortmann, R. L., Saville, P. D., & Harkness, A. R. (1981). Hindsight bias among physicians weighing the likelihood of diagnoses. Journal of Applied Psychology, 66, 252-254.
6. Ash, I. K. (2009). Surprise, memory, and retrospective judgment making: Testing cognitive reconstruction theories of the hindsight bias effect. Journal of Experimental Psychology: Learning, Memory, and Cognition, 35, 916-933.
7. Baron, J., & Hershey, J. (1988). Outcome bias in decision evaluation. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 54, 569-579.
8. Bayen, U., Pohl, R., Erdfelder, E., & Auer, T. (2007). Hindsight bias across the life span. Social Cognition, 25, 83-97.
9. Bernstein, D. M., Atance, C., Meltzoff, A. N., & Loftus, G. R. (2007). Hindsight bias and developing theories of mind. Child Development, 78, 1374-1394.
10. Bernstein, D. M., Erdfelder, E., Meltzhoff, A. N., Peria, W., & Loftus, G. R. (2011). Hindsight bias from 3 to 95years of age. Journal of Experimental Psychology: Learning, Memory, and Cognition, 37, 378-391.
11. Birch, S., & Bernstein, D. (2007). What can children tell us about hindsight bias: A fundamental constraint on perspective-taking? Social Cognition, 25, 98-113.
12. Blank, H., & Nestler, S. (2006). Perceiving events as both inevitable and unforeseeable in hindsight: The Leipzig candidacy for the Olympics. British Journal of Social Psychology, 45, 149-160.
13. Blank, H., & Nestler, S. (2007). Cognitive process models of hindsight bias. Social Cognition, 25, 132-146.
14. Blank, H., Nestler, S., von Collani, G., & Fischer, V. (2008). How many hindsight biases are there? Cognition, 106, 1408-1440.
15. Blank, H., & Peters, J. (2010). Controllability and hindsight components: Understanding opposite hindsight biases for self-relevant negative event outcomes. Memory & Cognition, 38, 356-365.
16. Bradfield, A., & Wells, G. L. (2005). Not the same old hindsight bias: Outcome information distorts a broad range of retrospective judgments. Memory & Cognition, 33, 120-130.
17. Buchheit, S., Pasewark, W. R., & Strawser, J. R. (2009). A comparison of auditor and non-auditor performance evaluations: Are accountants harsh critics? Managerial Auditing Journal, 24, 22-38.
18. Buehler, R., Griffin, D., & Ross, M. (1994). Exploring the 'planning fallacy': Why people underestimate their task completion times. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 67, 366-381.
19. Burrus, J., & Roese, N. (2006). Long ago it was meant to be: The interplay between time, construal, and fate beliefs. Personality and Social Psychology Bulletin, 32, 1050-1058.
20. Campbell, J. D., & Tesser, A. (1983). Motivational interpretations of hindsight bias: An individual difference analysis. Journal of Personality, 51, 605-620.
21. Carli, L. L. (1999). Cognitive reconstruction, hindsight, and reactions to victims and perpetrators. Personality & Social Psychology Bulletin, 25, 966-979.
22. Cavillo, D. P., & Gomes, D. M. (2011). Surprise influences hindsight-foresight differences in temporal judgments of animated automobile accidents. Psychonomic Bulletin Review, 18, 385-391.
23. Choi, D.-W., & Choi, I. (2010). A comparison of hindsight bias in groups and individuals: The moderating role of plausibility. Journal of Applied Social Psychology, 40, 325-343.
24. Choi, I., & Nisbett, R. E. (2000). Cultural psychology of surprise: Holistic theories and recognition of contradiction. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 79, 890-905.
25. Christensen-Szalanski, J. J., & Beach, L. R. (1984). The citation bias: Fad and fashion in the judgment and decision literature. American Psychologist, 39, 75-78.
26. Christensen-Szalanski, J. J. J., & Willham, C. F. (1991). The hindsight bias: A meta-analysis. Organizational Behavior and Human Decision Processes, 48, 147-168.
27. Clarkson, P., Emby, C., & Watt, V. (2002). Debiasing the outcome effect: The role of instructions in an audit litigation setting. Auditing: A Journal of Practice & Theory, 21, 7-20.
28. Cohen, J. (1988). Statistical Power Analysis for the Behavioral Sciences (2nd edn). Hillsdale, NJ: Erlbaum.
29. Connolly, T., & Zeelenberg, M. (2002). Regret in decision making. Current Directions in Psychological Science, 11, 212-216.
30. Emby, C., Gelardi, A., & Lowe, D. (2002). A research note on the influence of outcome knowledge on audit partners' judgments. Behavioral Research in Accounting, 14, 87-103.
31. Fessel, F., Epstude, K., & Roese, N. J. (2009). Hindsight bias redefined: It's about time. Organizational Behavior and Human Decision Processes, 110, 56-64.
32. Fischhoff, B. (1975). Hindsight ≠ foresight: The effect of outcome knowledge on judgment under uncertainty. Journal of Experimental Psychology: Human Perception and Performance, 104, 288-299.
33. Fischhoff, B. (1977). Perceived informativeness of facts. Journal of Experimental Psychology: Human Perception and Performance, 3, 349-358.
34. Fischhoff, B., & Beyth, R. (1975). "I knew it would happen"-Remembered probabilities of once future things. Organizational Behavior and Human Performance, 13, 1-16.
35. Fischhoff, B., Gonzalez, R. M., Lerner, J. S., & Small, D. A. (2005). Evolving judgments of terror risks: Foresight, hindsight, and emotion. Journal of Experimental Psychology: Applied, 11, 124-139.
36. Guilbault, R. L., Bryant, F. B., Brockway, J. H., & Prosavac, E. J. (2004). A meta-analysis of research on the hindsight bias. Basic and Applied Social Psychology, 26, 103-117.
37. Harley, E. M., Carlsen, K. A., & Loftus, G. R. (2004). The 'Saw-It-All-Along' effect: Demonstrations of visual hindsight bias. Journal of Experimental Psychology: Learning, Memory, and Cognition, 30, 960-968.
38. Hasher, L., Attig, M. S., & Alba, J. W. (1981). I knew it all along: Or did I? Journal of Verbal Learning and Verbal Behavior, 20, 86-96.
39. Hawkins, S. A., & Hastie, R. (1990). Hindsight: Biased judgments of past events after the outcomes are known. Psychological Bulletin, 107, 311-327.
40. Heine, S. J., & Lehman, D. R. (1996). Hindsight bias: A cross-cultural analysis. Japanese Journal of Experimental Social Psychology, 35, 317-323.
41. Hershey, J. C., & Baron, J. (1992). Judgment by outcomes: When is it justified? Organizational Behavior and Human Decision Processes, 53, 89-93.
42. Hoch, S. J., & Loewenstein, G. F. (1989). Outcome feedback: Hindsight and information. Journal of Experimental Psychology: Learning, Memory, and Cognition, 15, 605-619.
43. Hoffrage, U., Hertwig, R., & Gigerenzer, G. (2000). Hindsight bias: A by-product ofknowledge updating? Journal of Experimental Psychology: Learning, Memory, & Cognition, 26, 566-581.
44. Hölzl, E., Kirchler, E., & Rodler, C. (2002). Hindsight bias in economic expectations: I knew all along what I want to hear. Journal of Applied Psychology, 87, 437-443.
45. Jennings, M. M., Lowe, D. J., & Reckers, P. M. J. (1998). Causality as an influence on hindsight bias: An empirical evaluation of professional audit judgment. Journal of Accounting & Public Policy, 17, 143-168.
46. Jones, S. K., Yurak, T. J., & Frisch, D. (1997). The effect of outcome information on the evaluation and recall of individuals' own decisions. Organizational Behavior and Human Decision Processes, 71, 95-120.
47. Koriat, A., & Bjork, R. A. (2005). Illusions of competence in monitoring one's knowledge during study. Journal of Experimental Psychology: Learning, Memory, & Cognition, 31, 187-194.
48. Kruger, J., Wirtz, D., & Miller, D. T. (2005). Counterfactual thinking and the first instinct fallacy. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 88, 725-735.
49. Kubany, E. S., & Manke, F. P. (1995). Cognitive therapy for trauma-related guilt: Conceptual bases and treatment outlines. Cognitive and Behavioral Practice, 2, 23-61.
50. Labine, S. J., & Labine, G. (1996). Determinations of negligence and the hindsight bias. Law and Human Behavior, 20, 501-516.
51. Leary, M. R. (1981). The distorted nature of hindsight. Journal of Social Psychology, 115, 25-29.
52. Lichtenstein, S., Fischhoff, B., & Phillips, L. D. (1982). Calibration of probabilities: The state of the art to 1980. In D. Kahneman, P. Slovic & A. Tversky (Eds.), Judgment under Uncertainty: Heuristics and Biases (pp. 306-334). Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press.
53. Lipshitz, R. (1989). "Either a medal or a corporal": The effects of success and failure on the evaluation of decision making and decision makers. Organizational Behavior and Human Decision Processes, 44, 380-395.
54. Louie, T. A. (1999). Decision makers' hindsight bias after receiving favorable and unfavorable feedback. Journal of Applied Psychology, 84, 29-41.
55. Louie, T. A. (2005). Hindsight bias and outcome-consistent thoughts when observing and making service provider decisions. Organizational Behavior and Human Decision Processes, 98, 88-95.
56. Louie, T. A., Curren, M. T., & Harich, K. R. (2000). "I knew we would win": Hindsight bias for favorable and unfavorable team decision outcomes. Journal of Applied Psychology, 85, 264-272.
57. Lowe, D. J., & Reckers, P. M. J. (1994). The effects of hindsight bias on jurors' evaluations of auditor decisions. Decision Sciences, 25, 401-426.
58. Lundberg, C. G., & Svenson, O. (2000). Post decision consolidation in a trend prediction task. Scandinavian Journal of Psychology, 41, 159-168.
59. Mackie, D. M., & Ahn, M. N. (1998). Ingroup and outcome inferences: When ingroup bias overwhelms outcome-bias. European Journal of Social Psychology, 28, 343-360.
60. Mackie, D. M., Ahn, M. N., Asuncion, A., & Allison, S. T. (2001). The impact of perceiver attitude on outcome-biased trait inferences. Social Cognition, 19, 71-93.
61. Mark, M. M., Boburka, R. B., Eyssell, K. M., Cohen, L. L., & Mellor, S. (2003). "I couldn't have seen it coming": The impact of negative self-relevant outcomes on retrospections about foreseeability. Memory, 11, 443-454.
62. Mark, M. M., & Mellor, S. (1991). Effect of self-relevance of an event on hindsight bias: The foreseeability of a layoff. Journal of Applied Psychology, 76, 569-577.
63. Markman, K. D., & Tetlock, P. E. (2000). I could not have known: Accountability, foreseeability, and counterfactual denials of responsibility. British Journal of Social Psychology, 39, 313-325.
64. Menec, V. H., & Weiner, B. (2006). Observers' reactions to genetic testing: The role of hindsight bias and judgments of responsibility. Journal of Applied Social Psychology, 30, 1670-1690.
65. Mitchell, T. R., & Kalb, L. S. (1981). Effects of outcome knowledge and outcome valence on supervisors' evaluations. Journal of Applied Psychology, 66, 604-612.
66. Müller, P., & Stahlberg, D. (2007). The role of surprise in hindsight bias: A metacognitive model of reduced and reversed hindsight bias. Social Cognition, 25, 165-184.
67. Musch, J. (2003). Personality differences in hindsight bias. Memory, 11, 473-489.
68. Musch, J., & Wagner, T. (2007). Did everybody know it all along? A review of individual differences in hindsight bias. Social Cognition, 25, 64-82.
69. Nestler, S., Blank, H., & Egloff, B. (2010). Hindsight ≠ Hindsight: Experimentally induced dissociations between hindsight components. Journal of Experimental Psychology: Learning, Memory, and Cognition, 36, 1399-1413.
70. Nestler, S., Blank, H., & von Collani, G. (2008). Hindsight bias doesn't always come easy: Causal models, cognitive effort and creeping determinism. Journal of Experimental Psychology: Learning, Memory and Cognition, 34, 1043-1054.
71. Ofir, C., & Mazursky, D. (1997). Does a surprising outcome reinforce or reverse the hindsight bias? Organizational Behavior and Human Decision Processes, 69, 51-57.
72. Pezzo, M. V. (1996). Removing the Hindsight Bias: A Test of the Motivated Processing Hypothesis. Doctoral Dissertation, Ohio University.
73. Pezzo, M. V. (2003). Surprise, defense, or making sense: What removes hindsight bias? Memory, 11, 421-441.
74. Pezzo, M. V., & Beckstead, J. (2008). The effects of disappointment on hindsight bias for real-world outcomes. Applied Cognitive Psychology, 22, 491-506.
75. Pezzo, M. V., & Pezzo, S. P. (2006). Physician evaluation following medical errors: Does having a computer decision aid help or hurt in hindsight? Medical Decision Making, 26, 48-56.
76. Pezzo, M. V., & Pezzo, S. P. (2007). Making sense of failure: A motivated model of hindsight bias. Social Cognition, 25, 147-164.
77. Piercy, M. D. (2009). Motivated reasoning and verbal vs. numerical probability assessment: Evidence from an accounting context. Organizational Behavior and Human Decision Processes, 108, 330-341.
78. Pohl, R., Bayen, U., & Martin, C. (2010). A multiprocess account of hindsight bias in children. Developmental Psychology, 46, 1268-1282.
79. Pohl, R., Bender, M., & Lachmann, G. (2002). Hindsight bias around the world. Experimental Psychology, 49, 270-282.
80. Pohl, R. F., Schwarz, S., Sczesny, S., & Stahlberg, D. (2003). Hindsight bias in gustatory judgment. Experimental Psychology, 50, 107-115.
81. Ratner, R. K., & Herbst, K. C. (2005). When good decisions have bad outcomes: The impact of affect on switching behavior. Organizational Behavior and Human Decision Processes, 96, 23-37.
82. Reimers, J. L., & Butler, S. A. (1992). The effect of outcome knowledge on auditors' judgmental evaluations. Accounting Organizations and Society, 17, 185-194.
83. Renner, B. (2003). Hindsight bias after receiving self-relevant health risk information. Memory, 11, 455-472.
84. Roese, N. J. (2004). Twisted pair: Counterfactual thinking and the hindsight bias. In D. Koehler & N. Harvey (Eds.), Blackwell Handbook of Judgment and Decision Making (pp. 258-273). Oxford: Blackwell.
85. Roese, N. J., & Maniar, S. D. (1997). Perceptions of purple: Counterfactual and hindsight judgments at northwestern wildcats football games. Personality and Social Psychology Bulletin, 23, 1245-1253.
86. Sanna, L. J., Schwarz, N., & Small, E. M. (2002). Accessibility experiences and the hindsight bias: I knew it all along versus it could never have happened. Memory & Cognition, 30, 1288-1296.
87. Sanna, L. J., Schwarz, N., & Stocker, S. L. (2002). When debiasing backfires: Accessible content and accessibility experiences in debiasing hindsight. Journal of Experimental Psychology: Learning, Memory, and Cognition, 28, 497-502.
88. Slovic, P., & Fischhoff, B. (1977). On the psychology of experimental surprises. Journal of Experimental Psychology: Human Perception and Performance, 3, 544-551.
89. Sweeny, K., & Shepperd, J. (2007). Do people brace sensibly? Personality and Social Psychology Bulletin, 33, 1064-1075.
90. Tan, H.-T., & Lipe, M. G. (1997). Outcome effects: The impact of decision process and outcome controllability. Journal of Behavioral Decision Making, 10, 315-325.
91. Tykocinski, O. E. (2001). I never had a chance: Using hindsight tactics to mitigate disappointments. Personality and Social Psychology Bulletin, 27, 376-382.
92. Tykocinski, O. E., Pick, D., & Kedmi, D. (2002). Retroactive pessimism: A different kind of hindsight bias. European Journal of Social Psychology, 32, 577-588.
93. Wasserman, D., Lempert, R. O., & Hastie, R. (1991). Hindsight and causality. Personality and Social Psychology Bulletin, 17, 30-35.
94. Werth, L., & Strack, F. (2003). An inferential approach to the knew-it-all-along phenomenon. Memory, 11, 411-419.
95. Wilson, T. D., & Gilbert, D. T. (2008). Explaining away: A model of affective adaptation. Perspectives on Psychological Science, 3, 370-386.
96. Wilson, T. D., Gilbert, D. T., & Centerbar, D. B. (2003). Making sense: The causes of emotional evanescence. In I. Brocas & J. D. Carrillo (Eds.), The Psychology of Economic Decisions. Vol. 1. Rationality and Well Being (pp. 209-233). New York: Oxford University Press.
97. Wong, L. Y. S. (1995). Research on teaching: Process-product research findings and the feeling of obviousness. Journal of Educational Psychology, 87, 504-511.