Glossary
Proportionality Bias
What is Proportionality Bias?
Proportionality bias is the tendency to expect a major event to have a correspondingly major cause. The scale of an outcome can make an elaborate explanation feel more plausible even when the evidence for that explanation has not improved.
Proportionality bias research example
Leman and Cinnirella gave 64 participants different versions of a hypothetical attack on a president. Participants more often endorsed a conspiracy explanation when the president died than when the president survived. The result supports a major-event/major-cause heuristic within this task.
Proportionality bias and conspiracy theories
This is one possible influence on causal judgment, not another name for conspiracy belief as a whole. It does not establish why a particular person believes a particular historical account. Large outcomes can have simple or complex causes; the relevant question is what the evidence supports. Evaluate the causal evidence separately from the emotional importance of an outcome.