title: Working memory and spatial judgments: Cognitive load increases the central tendency bias.
abstract: Previous work demonstrates that memory for simple stimuli can be biased by information about the distribution of which the stimulus is a member. Specifically, people underestimate values greater than the distribution's average and overestimate values smaller than the average. This is referred to as the central tendency bias. This bias has been explained as an optimal use of both noisy sensory information and category information. In largely separate literature, cognitive load (CL) experiments attempt to manipulate the available working memory of participants in order to observe the effect on choice or judgments. In two experiments, we demonstrate that participants under high cognitive load exhibit a stronger central tendency bias than when under a low cognitive load. Although not anticipated at the outset, we also find that judgments exhibit an anchoring bias not described previously.
authors.affiliation: Department of Psychology, Rutgers University-Camden, 343 Armitage Hall, 511 N. 5th Street, Camden, NJ, 08102, USA.
authors.forename: Sarah R
authors.initials: SR
authors.lastname: Allred
authors.affiliation: Department of Psychology, The University of Richmond, Richmond, VA, USA.
authors.forename: L Elizabeth
authors.initials: LE
authors.lastname: Crawford
authors.affiliation: Department of Psychology, Rutgers University-Camden, 343 Armitage Hall, 511 N. 5th Street, Camden, NJ, 08102, USA. seduffy@scarletmail.rutgers.edu.
authors.forename: Sean
authors.initials: S
authors.lastname: Duffy
authors.affiliation: Department of Economics, Rutgers University-Camden, Camden, NJ, USA.
authors.forename: John
authors.initials: J
authors.lastname: Smith
mesh_terms: D015982:Bias; D002755:Choice Behavior; D003071:Cognition; D005260:Female; D006801:Humans; D007600:Judgment; D008297:Male; D008570:Memory, Short-Term; D013028:Space Perception
keywords: Anchoring; Cognitive constraints; Cognitive load; Judgment; Memory; Working memory