Editing Confirmation bias (section)

=== Persistence of discredited beliefs ===
{{main|Belief perseverance}}
{{see also|Cognitive dissonance|Monty Hall problem}}

{{Quote box |quote=Beliefs can survive potent logical or empirical challenges. They can survive and even be bolstered by evidence that most uncommitted observers would agree logically demands some weakening of such beliefs. They can even survive the total destruction of their original evidential bases. |source=—Lee Ross and Craig Anderson<ref name="shortcomings"/> |width=30% |align=right}}
Confirmation biases provide one plausible explanation for the persistence of beliefs when the initial evidence for them is removed or when they have been sharply contradicted.<ref name ="nickerson"/>{{rp|187}} This belief perseverance effect has been first demonstrated experimentally by [[Leon Festinger|Festinger]], Riecken, and Schachter. These psychologists [[Participant observation|spent time with]] a cult whose members were convinced that the world would end on 21 December 1954. After the prediction failed, most believers still clung to their faith. Their book describing this research is aptly named ''[[When Prophecy Fails]]''.<ref>{{Citation | last=Festinger | first=Leon | title=When prophecy fails: A social and psychological study of a modern group that predicted the destruction of the world | publisher=New York: Harper Torchbooks.| year=1956}}</ref>

The term ''belief perseverance'', however, was coined in a series of experiments using what is called the "debriefing paradigm": participants read fake evidence for a hypothesis, their [[attitude change]] is measured, then the fakery is exposed in detail. Their attitudes are then measured once more to see if their belief returns to its previous level.<ref name="shortcomings">{{Citation|last1=Ross |first1=Lee |first2=Craig A. |last2=Anderson |title=Judgment under uncertainty: Heuristics and biases |journal=Science |volume=185 |issue=4157 |pages=1124–1131 |bibcode=1974Sci...185.1124T |doi=10.1126/science.185.4157.1124 |year=1974 |pmid=17835457|s2cid=143452957 }}.<br />{{Citation|editor1-first=Daniel |editor1-last=Kahneman |editor2-first=Paul |editor2-last=Slovic |editor3-first=Amos |editor3-last=Tversky |publisher=Cambridge University Press |year=1982 |chapter=Shortcomings in the attribution process: On the origins and maintenance of erroneous social assessments |isbn=978-0-521-28414-1 |oclc=7578020|title=Judgment under uncertainty: Heuristics and biases}}</ref>

A common finding is that at least some of the initial belief remains even after a full debriefing.<ref name="kunda99">{{Harvnb|Kunda|1999|p=99}}</ref> In one experiment, participants had to distinguish between real and fake suicide notes. The feedback was random: some were told they had done well while others were told they had performed badly. Even after being fully debriefed, participants were still influenced by the feedback. They still thought they were better or worse than average at that kind of task, depending on what they had initially been told.<ref>{{Citation |last1=Ross |first1=Lee |first2=Mark R. |last2=Lepper |first3=Michael |last3=Hubbard |title=Perseverance in self-perception and social perception: Biased attributional processes in the debriefing paradigm |journal=Journal of Personality and Social Psychology |volume=32 |issn=0022-3514 |pages=880–is 892 |year=1975 |issue=5 |doi=10.1037/0022-3514.32.5.880 |pmid=1185517}} via {{Harvnb|Kunda|1999|p=99}}</ref>

In another study, participants read [[job performance]] ratings of two firefighters, along with their responses to a [[risk aversion]] test.<ref name="shortcomings" /> This fictional data was arranged to show either a negative or positive association: some participants were told that a risk-taking firefighter did better, while others were told they did less well than a risk-averse colleague.<ref name="socialperseverance" /> Even if these two case studies were true, they would have been scientifically poor evidence for a conclusion about firefighters in general. However, the participants found them subjectively persuasive.<ref name="socialperseverance">{{Citation |title=Perseverance of social theories: The role of explanation in the persistence of discredited information |first1=Craig A. |last1=Anderson |first2=Mark R. |last2=Lepper |first3=Lee |last3=Ross |journal=Journal of Personality and Social Psychology |year=1980 |volume=39 |issue=6 |pages=1037–1049 |issn=0022-3514 |doi=10.1037/h0077720|citeseerx=10.1.1.130.933 }}</ref> When the case studies were shown to be fictional, participants' belief in a link diminished, but around half of the original effect remained.<ref name="shortcomings" /> Follow-up interviews established that the participants had understood the debriefing and taken it seriously. Participants seemed to trust the debriefing, but regarded the discredited information as irrelevant to their personal belief.<ref name="socialperseverance" />

The [[continued influence effect]] is the tendency for misinformation to continue to influence memory and reasoning about an event, despite the misinformation having been retracted or corrected. This occurs even when the individual believes the correction.<ref>{{cite journal | last=Cacciatore | first=Michael A. | title=Misinformation and public opinion of science and health: Approaches, findings, and future directions | journal=Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences | volume=118 | issue=15 | date=9 April 2021 | issn=0027-8424 | doi=10.1073/pnas.1912437117 | page=e1912437117 | pmid=33837143 | pmc=8053916 | bibcode=2021PNAS..11812437C | quote=The CIE refers to the tendency for information that is initially presented as true, but later revealed to be false, to continue to affect memory and reasoning | quote-page=4  | mode=cs2| doi-access=free }}</ref>