Chuck Dinerstein
American Council on Science and Health
Originally published 4 Sept 25
While chance plays a role in many, if not all, of our decisions and consequences, its role is both partial and variable. As a result, our understanding of “cause” is ambiguous, which, in turn, distorts our judgments and predictions. It helps to explain why all my achievements come from hard work, while yours were due to luck. To generalize, we all underestimate the role of chance in the outcomes of our actions, viewing our “task performance over time as diagnostic of ability.”
The research, reported in PNAS Nexus, investigates situations entirely determined by chance, e.g., coin flips, where past performance should have no bearing on future expectations. The study examined how people's expectations and behaviors were affected by actual lucky successes and unlucky failures.
Using both real and virtual coins, participants were asked to predict the outcomes of a sequence of five coin tosses. The researchers observed how the experience of varying degrees of "lucky successes" and "unlucky failures" influenced subsequent expectations and behaviors, anticipating three possible responses.
Here are some thoughts:
In essence, this article provides psychologists with a clear, compelling, and generalizable model for understanding one of the most pervasive and problematic aspects of human cognition: our innate drive to impose order and causality on randomness. It explains why people believe in luck, superstitions, and false cause-and-effect relationships, and why data often fails to change minds. This understanding is foundational for developing better communication strategies, designing effective interventions against misinformation, improving decision-making in high-stakes fields, and ultimately, helping individuals make more rational choices in their personal and professional lives.
