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QUESTION-109: When does cue-dependent retrieval make bounded reasoning better, and when does it produce anchoring, path dependence or entrenchment?

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Properties7
StatusOpen
Tagscognition, epistemology
Linenucleating-argument
Refined byQUESTION-107 — When does iterative query reformulation improve access to relevant evidence, and when does it entrench an initial interpretation by narrowing what is encountered next?
BearingCLAIM-315 — In comparative anchoring tasks, considering an anchor shifts the later numerical estimate without adding evidence about the target, and the shift is carried by anchor-consistent knowledge made more accessible; the shift is established, the accessibility step is inferred and has not been measured, THEORY-335 — Selective accessibility, the account that comparing a target with a plausible anchor makes anchor-consistent knowledge more accessible and that this knowledge carries anchoring, fits the moderations of the effect by applicability, representativeness and plausibility that Strack and Mussweiler found, but its accessibility step is inferred, not measured: Harris et al.'s repetition of the recognition test of it, four times by lexical decision and once by continuous identification, found nothing in five preregistered experiments, with tasks that also missed direct picture priming
Cited as “bears on” byCLAIM-184 — Anchors entrench: a structure that persists early can lock in its framing, so that later structure grows on it and alternatives become hard to reach, and retirement by status is the record's remedy only if superseded anchors stop attracting new structure
Cited as “refines” byQUESTION-323 — After an anchoring comparison, is anchor-consistent knowledge more accessible on a measure first shown sensitive to direct priming, and does the difference go with the size of the estimate shift?

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Why it is a question

A20 §5: “A bounded interpreter cannot consider all potentially relevant information on every decision. It needs a way to prioritize retrieval. Anchors, contexts, and initial hypotheses can provide that prioritization. But prioritization makes judgment path-dependent.” And “An anchor makes information easier to reach. A bias can emerge when what is easier to reach is mistaken for what deserves greater weight.”

The selective-accessibility account of anchoring (Strack and Mussweiler, LIT-1064 and LIT-1078, unread) is the established mechanism, as A20 said: “we wouldn’t be discovering retrieval-mediated anchoring from scratch.” In the record, CLAIM-184 says anchors entrench. This question asks when the cost CLAIM-184 names is paid, and when the benefit CLAIM-182 names is.

An answer separates retrieval, evaluation and judgement under a varied frame, and says for which tasks and cue policies selection helps. CLAIM-292 keeps the answer from being “always bias”.

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