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Category

Social Biases

Impact level

2 / 5

Category Social Biases

Impact 2 / 5

SOCIAL BIASES

Actor-Observer
Bias

The tendency to attribute one's own actions to external causes while attributing other people's behaviors to internal causes.

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Cognitive processing

System 1 (fast, intuitive). Biases often lean on quick judgments (System 1) unless you slow down and analyze (System 2).

Evidence & time

Evidence strength: experimental. Typical read: about 4 min.

Catch it next time

Practical steps for Actor-Observer Bias

1
Put yourself in the other person's shoes
high effectivenessmoderate difficulty

Tape this to your desk.

02

Common triggers

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Judging someone else's mistake

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Explaining your own mistake

03

Typical contexts

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Traffic incidents

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Relationship disputes

04

Mitigation strategies

Put yourself in the other person's shoes

Effectiveness: high

Difficulty: moderate

05

Potential decision harms

Misunderstanding others' motivations

moderate Severity

Unfair judgment

moderate Severity