Do you think your decisions are really yours?
How the human mind works, what hidden processes govern thoughts, what everyday actions are based on. In The Book of Biases (Godot), writer Ricardo Romero explores these cognitive mechanisms . Confirmation bias, the fallacy of composition, the paradox of choice, and the illusion of clustering—all processes the brain employs that function as lenses through which we view reality.
Did you choose to buy that comfortable chair? Are you sure? And how much autonomy did your partner have in building it? Drawing on concepts derived from social psychology , this book is an invitation to delve into the labyrinths of the mind .
In conversation with Viva , Romero casts his critical and playful eye on these processes that, while invisible , determine choices as diverse as shopping at the supermarket or the construction of a personal identity. From the intersection of social psychology, philosophy, and pop culture —with references to Bowie, Stalker, and social media—the book proposes an exercise in uncomfortable thinking : stopping, doubting, disobeying automatisms, and exploring the stories we tell ourselves to remain who we are.
–What is cognitive dissonance and why can it be thought of as an opportunity?
–Basically, paraphrasing one of the characters in one of my favorite films (Stalker, I can't remember if it's the writer or the professor), you could say it's the friction between our conscience and the world: time and again, the world challenges our beliefs and convictions, our experiences and knowledge, from the most trivial to those that define us. Cognitive dissonance is the perception of those contradictions to which friction subjects us. We can accommodate ideas, strain them, falsify them, in order to continue believing or thinking the same thing. We do it all the time. But we can also try to figure out what happens if we change our minds, if we allow ourselves to think differently, from another place, to challenge our omnipresent narrative (be it intimate or social). The most interesting artists do this all the time. Bowie is a beautiful example. What the Bowie of the nineties thought of the Bowie of the eighties, the way he looked at him with patience and strangeness...
We can accommodate ideas, strain them, falsify them, in order to continue believing or thinking the same thing.
–Why do you say that there is only one step from shyness to arrogance?
–I don't think it's always like that. But I think both shyness and pride have to do with the ferocity of self-consciousness: overthinking ourselves and paying too much attention to how others pay attention to us.
Argentine writer and editor Ricardo Romero at his home in the San Telmo neighborhood. Photo: Mariana Nedelcu.
–What does it mean to live in artificial empathy bubbles?
–It's nothing new, but social media has exponentially exacerbated this mirage. App algorithms repeatedly lead us to a dead end where we all think more or less the same, consume more or less the same things, and have more or less the same aversions. And we like being there. Recognizing each other, even congratulating each other when we identify some cultural nod, a codified belonging. I'm not saying it's necessarily wrong; I mean, seeking out encounters with those who think or feel or express themselves like us builds community. The problem is that sometimes the mirage becomes so perfect that we become unaccustomed to the discomfort, the unease, the uncertainty of facing a scenario we don't recognize.
–Why do you say that confirmation bias makes us predictable?
–It has to do with the previous question, with the same cognitive dissonance: if we only seek to confirm what we think, our thinking is anchored in the past. We are pre-told. We are ready to be buried in the mass grave of statistics.
–How can the Anchor Effect be explained? Could you elaborate on the example of supermarket discounts, which you discuss in the book?
–You'd better ask someone in marketing or advertising about this. They know exactly what to say to get me to go to the supermarket on the day they want, check out the deals they decide, and end up buying the beer they chose that week. Which is usually delicious, by the way, I'm not going to complain. The key is that they didn't just get me to consume what they wanted me to consume. The triumph, the anchor that pulls me along, comes before: they got me to consume even when I wasn't thinking about it.
–Is recency bias a current phenomenon or has it existed before?
–It's a curious question. Actuality and the present are entangled... No, I don't think it's a new thing. Perhaps what's most noticeable is how the anchoring effect is undermined by recency bias. The first thing we're told influences our thinking and decision-making, but the last thing also inexorably marks us. It's the logic of news, of urgency. "Scoop... breaking news." The first thing is also the last thing. There's no room for digression, for detours; we have to decide now, before they start talking about something else.
Argentine writer and editor Ricardo Romero at his home in the San Telmo neighborhood. Photo: Mariana Nedelcu.
–What can you tell us about the Zeigarnik effect? It's very interesting to think that with the number of steps we take due to this effect, we could circle the globe.
–It's part of the neuronal economy, so to speak. We remember unfinished things better than those we've finished. I do it and I forget. I do it so many times that I forget it even in the moment of doing it. And then I have to go back and check if I did it... The trip around the world always ends in front of the switched-off stovetop.
–What good does it do to us in our daily lives to know and understand these signs?
–I think it helps us think better, which doesn't necessarily mean being more assertive. Learning to live with doubt, avoiding immediate answers, stopping for a while from asking Google the name of the actor who played the corrupt cop in that 1980s movie whose name we also can't remember, to see if the name comes to mind two or three days later while I'm washing dishes. And on the other hand, do I really want to be thinking about this? And above all, do I really want to think about this and in this way? As a storyteller, what matters most to me is that what is being narrated finds its natural way of being told. Because I would like to insist on this point: the way we express ourselves is always political.
- He was born in 1976 in Paraná, Entre Ríos, and graduated in Modern Literature from the National University of Córdoba.
Argentine writer and editor Ricardo Romero at his home in the San Telmo neighborhood. Photo: Mariana Nedelcu.
- Since 2002 he has lived in the City of Buenos Aires.
- He is the author of the novels Nowhere, The Rasputin Syndrome, Dancers at the End of the World, Rain Dogs, The Spleen of the Dead, History of Roque Rey, The President's Room, The Janitor and Eternity and Big Rip .
The Book of Biases , by Ricardo Romero (Godot).
Clarin
