Even educated human beings are notoriously poor at thinking statistically.The availability heuristic, first identified by Daniel Kahneman and Amos Tversky, is a mental shortcut that occurs when people judge the probability of events by how easy it is to think of examples. The availability heuristic operates on the notion that, "if you can think of it, it must be important." Availability can be influenced by the emotional power of examples and by their perceived frequency; while personal, first-hand incidents are more available than those that happened to others, availability can be skewed by the media. In his book Thinking, Fast and Slow, Kahneman cites the examples of celebrity divorces and airplane crashes; both are more often reported by the media, and thus tend to be exaggerated in perceived frequency.
Read more about this topic: Availability Cascade, Belief Formation
Famous quotes containing the word availability:
“Since ... six weeks ago, there has been no day in which I have not had letters and visits on the subject of my nomination for the Presidency.... I say very little. I have in no instance encouraged any one to work to that end.... I have said the whole talk about me is on the score of availability. Let availability do the work then.”
—Rutherford Birchard Hayes (1822–1893)