The availability heuristic

The availability heuristic is another mental shortcut we use to make judgments, in this case based on how easily examples or instances of something come to mind.

If we can easily recall examples of an event or category, we tend to assume it is more common or likely than it might actually be.

Ease of Recall as an Indicator

This heuristic operates on the premise that "if it's easy to recall, it must be important or frequent."

When we're trying to judge the frequency of an event or the likelihood of something happening, we often turn to our memories for examples.

Events that are vivid, recent, or emotionally charged tend to be easier to recall and may therefore disproportionately influence our judgments.

For example, if we've just watched several news reports about plane crashes, we might overestimate the risk of flying, simply because those examples are very readily available in our minds, even though statistically flying is very safe.

Availability and Self-Judgments

The availability heuristic affects not only our judgments about the external world, but also about ourselves.

One study asked participants to recall six examples of times they had behaved assertively.

Because recalling six examples is relatively easy for most people, these people judged themselves to be quite assertive.

Another group was asked to recall twelve examples of their own assertive behavior. This task is considerably more difficult.

As a result, despite having recalled (or attempted to recall) more instances of assertiveness, these people judged themselves to be less assertive than the first group.

Their difficulty in bringing all twelve examples to mind led to the conclusion that they must not be very assertive.

This shows how the ease or difficulty of retrieving information, and not just the amount, influences our judgments.

Limitations and Possible Pitfalls

While the ease with which something comes to mind can sometimes be a good indicator of its frequency, this is not always the case.

What is most available in our memory is not necessarily the most representative or the most frequent in reality.

Dramatic or unusual events, although infrequent, can be very memorable and therefore overestimated in our judgments.

Being aware of this heuristic helps us question our first impressions and seek more objective or statistical information before jumping to conclusions based solely on how easily we recall examples.