Never violating a taboo prevents learners from disconfirming it, preserving it via negativity bias.

Evidence

3. A good learner will acquire this rule while growing up and never actually violate it (meat is consumed in public), so he’ll never directly experience eating the tabooed part and not having bad luck. Rare cases of taboo violations that, by coincidence, were followed by bad luck or illness will be readily remembered and passed on (psychologists call this “negativity bias”). Meanwhile, cases of violations followed by a long period when nothing bad happens will tend to be missed or forgotten, unless people keep and check accurate records. — Joseph Henrich, The Secret of Our Success, 519

Categorization

• XREF: connects to: Distrust restricts information so the distruster never learns to distrust less — Russell Hardin, Trust and Trustworthiness, 984; Stereotypes remain stable despite contradicting observations or even reversing

Broader Connections

• Distrust restricts information so the distruster never learns to distrust less #expands (0.85) — Russell Hardin, Trust and Trustworthiness, 984
• Stereotypes remain stable despite contradicting observations or even reversing #corroborates (0.82)