Confirmatory filtering operates already at the level of perception and memory.

Evidence

Confirmation bias describes the experience that only those facts are taken on board that strengthen one’s own views; others are weakened or ignored. We hold on to our opinions more firmly, the more they are emotionally significant and part of a broader world view. This filtering sieve is already at work in perception, influencing how we interpret and store data and how we remember it. The confirmation bias becomes active especially when it comes to basic attitudes and values of a person and when the topic seems important to us. Changing one’s position would lead to far-reaching shifts in our view of the world and our self-image. This costs energy, is often associated with feelings of shame, and is therefore largely avoided. — Holm Gero Hümmler, Ulrike Schiesser, Fact and Prejudice, 153

Categorization

• XREF: Connects to motivated reasoning literature and Festinger’s cognitive dissonance.

Related

• Preconceived expectations filter what we physically hear in conversation (similarity 0.81)
• Motivated reasoning is the motive while confirmation bias is the mechanism (similarity 0.81)
• People deploy selective perception and motivated reasoning routinely when faced with evidence (similarity 0.80)
• Stereotypes act as hypotheses that bias evidence gathering toward confirmation (similarity 0.80)
• Cognitive biases vary from common mild heuristics to rare deliberate distortions (similarity 0.80)
• Stereotypes actively reaffirmed become deeply rooted beliefs that resist contradiction (similarity 0.79)
• Confirmation bias persists across scientists, laypeople, and prejudiced judgment. (similarity 0.79)
• Stress drives the brain toward cognitively cheaper confirmation bias (similarity 0.79)
• Reducing existing prejudice requires countering confirmation-biased information processing (similarity 0.79)