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A Skeptical Studies Curriculum Resource

Brain Glitches: Cognitive Biases

These resources are from a Summer Youth Program for High School Students titled, “Brain Glitches” and taught by Diane Graft. You can find in-class exercises for this summer course here.

Our brain is the best tool we have for understanding the world, but our mental software has bugs. We have a better chance of sorting out the truth from the baloney if we understand the ways in which our brain works. The PowerPoints provided here are used to discuss many topics with students, including:

  • Confirmation Bias
  • Agency Detection and False Positives
  • Anchoring Bias and the Decoy Effect
  • Memory Failures/Filling in the Gaps
  • Placebo Effect
  • Sunk Cost Fallacy
  • Backfire Effect
  • Probability
  • Type 1 & Type 2 Errors

Anchoring Bias PowerPoint Found Here:
DOWNLOAD THIS RESOURCE
(815 kb Powerpoint Presentation)

Confirmation Bias PowerPoint Found Here:
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(1.8 MB Powerpoint Presentation)

Memory PowerPoint Found Here:
DOWNLOAD THIS RESOURCE
(622 kb Powerpoint Presentation)

1 Comment »

One response to “Brain Glitches: Cognitive Biases”

  1. Martin says:

    Hello, could you please tell me, regarding the 3rd presentation, slide 9 – what is changing between those 2 pictures of the haze? I stared at it for quite a long time, but didn’t see anything… It would be really helpful if there is an answer in the notes page.
    Thank you very much.

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