Need to
Act Fast.
We rarely have time, attention, or full information. So we choose with confidence we haven't earned, prefer what feels safe, and react more sharply to loss than to gain. Designers shape every nudge along the way.
The decision traps you should know.
Tap any card for the full entry. Pages marked coming soon are still being written.
Anchoring Bias
The first number we see shapes every number we judge after it.
Loss Aversion
Losing $10 stings more than winning $10 cheers — by about double.
Status Quo Bias
The current setup feels safe even when a better one is one click away.
Sunk-Cost Fallacy
We finish what we started — even when starting over is cheaper.
Effort Justification
We over-value what we built ourselves, however wobbly.
Default Effect
Most users accept the default — make defaults a moral choice.
Decoy Effect
A third, worse option makes the option next to it look brilliant.
Scarcity Effect
Few left, ending soon — pressure cuts deliberation short.
Framing Effect
Same fact, different frame, different decision.
Bandwagon Effect
We adopt beliefs and behaviours because others around us already have.
Hyperbolic Discounting
We prefer a smaller reward now over a larger reward later.
Paradox of Choice
More options feels like freedom but produces paralysis and regret.
Planning Fallacy
We underestimate how long, costly, and risky our plans will be.
Reactance
Tell people they can't have something and they want it more.
Zero-Risk Bias
We prefer eliminating a small risk entirely over significantly reducing a large one.
Actor-Observer Bias
We attribute others' actions to character and our own to circumstances.
Ambiguity Bias
We prefer known risks over unknown ones — ambiguity feels like danger.
Appeal to Novelty
We treat novelty as evidence of superiority without proof it works better.
Backfire Effect
Corrective information sometimes strengthens the mistaken belief it was meant to fix.
Barnum Effect
Vague, flattering statements feel uniquely accurate — so we trust the source.
Belief Bias
We judge arguments by whether we believe the conclusion — not whether the logic holds.
Bike-Shedding Effect
Teams spend disproportionate time on trivial issues because they are easy to understand.
Conjunction Fallacy
Vivid combined scenarios feel more likely than simpler, more probable ones.
Defensive Attribution Hypothesis
We blame victims more when we feel different from them — to maintain a sense of safety.
Delmore Effect
We prefer comparing easy attributes over hard ones — even when the hard choice matters more.
Disposition Effect
We sell winners too early and hold losers too long — anchored to original cost or effort.
Egocentric Bias
We overestimate how much others share our perspective, knowledge, and preferences.
Endowment Effect
We value things more highly simply because we own or possess them.
Escalation of Commitment
We increase commitment to a failing course of action because of prior investment.
Forer Effect
People accept vague, general statements as uniquely accurate descriptions of themselves.
Generation Effect
Information we generate or assemble ourselves is remembered better than information we passively receive.
Hard-Easy Effect
Confidence calibration varies with task difficulty — overconfidence on hard tasks, underconfidence on easy ones.
Identifiable Victim Effect
We respond more strongly to a single identifiable victim than to large numbers of anonymous sufferers.
Illusion of Control
We overestimate our ability to control outcomes that are actually determined by chance or external forces.
Illusory Superiority
We tend to rate ourselves as above average on desirable traits and skills.
Information Bias
We seek additional information even when it cannot improve the decision — mistaking activity for progress.
Irrational Escalation
We escalate commitment beyond rational limits — especially under competition, sunk costs, or public stakes.
Lake Wobegon Effect
Groups systematically over-report performance above statistical norms — 'all the children are above average.'
Less-Is-Better Effect
Lesser options are preferred in isolation but rejected when compared directly to more complete alternatives.
Occam's Razor Bias
We favour simple explanations over complex ones — even when simplicity misleads.
Overconfidence Effect
We systematically overestimate the accuracy of our beliefs, predictions, and abilities.
Peltzman Effect
Safety improvements can lead to riskier behaviour that partially or fully offsets the benefit.
Processing Difficulty Effect
Information that requires more cognitive effort to process can be remembered better — contrary to fluency intuitions.
Pseudocertainty Effect
We respond to partial certainty as if it were complete — depending on how choices are framed.
Reverse Psychology
Forbidden or discouraged actions become more attractive — reactance-driven reversal.
Rhyme-as-Reason Effect
Rhyming statements are judged as more accurate and truthful than non-rhyming equivalents.
Risk Compensation
People adjust behaviour when perceived risk changes — often offsetting safety gains.
Social Comparison Bias
We evaluate ourselves and our work by comparing to others — distorting judgment and motivation.
Social Desirability Bias
We respond in ways that make us look good to others — distorting surveys and interviews.
System Justification
We tend to defend existing social systems and status quo — even when they disadvantage us.
Third-Person Effect
We believe media and persuasion affect others more than they affect us.
Trait Ascription Bias
We view ourselves as flexible and others as having fixed, stable traits.
Unit Bias
We tend to want one unit of consumption — a portion, serving, or package — regardless of its size.
Three other ways minds bend.
Too Much
Information
Too Much
Information
There's too much to process. We filter — and the filtering is where bias creeps in.
Not Enough
Meaning
Not Enough
Meaning
Stories, patterns, and confident-sounding causes filling in the gaps.
What Should
We Remember
What Should
We Remember
Memory as reconstruction — peaks, endings, and the odd-one-out.