Am I right ?

Most of us would have worked with colleagues who feel “I AM ALWAYS RIGHT”. Proving them wrong is impossible, because they will come up with numerous theories supporting their hypotheses. 

I am sure we would have had the experience of buying a new car or new bike.   Driving it around, you start noticing many similar models on roads that you never happen to notice all along. Have you tried to find out why? It is because you had a reason to look out as you have the same car. You can’t help it, because it is in your mind and you see the model everywhere you look. In our life, we would face similar situations. This phenomenon is called “Confirmation Bias”.  

As we know, bias does no good in one’s life. Confirmation bias can be lethal and fatal as well. Hard to believe? Let me explain with a real-life incident

I have been watching Air Crash Investigations in Nat Geo and Here is a story of Varig Flight 254 which made a forced landing in the Amazon jungle, 600 miles off course

On 03 Sep 1989, Varig Flight 254 take-off preparations were mid-way when Captain looked at the flight plan and saw that the required magnetic heading to Belem was 0270. The Captain thought that this meant 270 degrees, when in fact it was 027.0 degrees. He entered 270 degrees in LHS heading indicator.   After this, he programmed Aircraft Performance Management System PMS to the distance to Belem at an altitude of 29000ft which will give air time of 48minutes.  The First officer completed the external checks and entered the cock-pit. He looked at Captain’s indicator and entered same 270 degrees in RHS heading indicator. At 17:54hrs, the flight took off from Maraba, headed towards setting sun. 40minutes into flight, Captain tried contacting Belem ATC but no response. He then tried contacting them through Very High Frequency VHF Radio and obtained descent clearance. On descent, captain found it unusual as he could not recognize any geographical features of Belem area (Amazon River estuary). PMS started showing negative distance to destination (i.e, aircraft had already passed the destination point). The Captain executed a 180degree turn and tried to locate Belem visually. Cruising at 4000ft, the captain was reluctant to use VHF Radio help, the captain decided to take visual reference from a river he located below the flight, believing it to be R. Amazon, but it turned out to be R. Xingu. By this time, flight was 30minutes overdue the scheduled time, passengers panicked, fuel levels going down and with no other possibility, the pilots force landed the flight into Amazon rainforest. At 21:06hrs, the plane crash-landed over tree tops at 50m above ground, 40mph speed before coming to a grinding halt. 

On September 5, two days after the crash, the rescue team reached the crash spot after some of the survivors walked hours through the rainforest to a farm house and contacted Brazilian Air Force. Out of 54 people including crew, there were 13 fatalities, however both pilots survived with injuries

Investigations revealed that flight was in perfect mechanical condition and wrong magnetic heading led flight flew off course resulting in crash. Psychologists in Investigation team claimed that pilots exhibited confirmation bias at different places

a.      First officer matched his indicator with Captain’s indicator, because of his personal trust and confidence with Captain. As per Aviation rules, first officer is supposed to check flight plan and then gauge the indicator

b.      When regular communication channels with Belem ATC did not work, the Captain switched to VHF instead of analyzing what went wrong

c.      After taking off from Maraba, the flight flew into setting sun which is west while Belem is situated north of Maraba. A strong sense of confirmation that they are on right path. Common sense overruled. 

d.      The Captain executed a 180degree turn and instead of accepting that they are off-course, the captain attempted to locate their position by following incorrectly identified river for over thirty minutes, without using any navigational tools

To put it simple, the pilots had “I AM DOING IT RIGHT” car model in forefront on their mind and looked for possible evidences to support their thoughts and hypothesis. Under Confirmation Bias, our mind looks out for things to prove our confirmation and decision leading to invisible trap that would eventually bring irreversible and undesirable consequences. While confirmation Bias is hard to spot and we go through this bias multiple times every day, there are multiple ways to deal with it – one of them is Fresh Eyes review. One of my supervisors advised me that whenever I have to send out an important mail or presentation, I need to save it in drafts, get up from my seat, grab a coffee, come back and go through the mail. This has worked and I have spotted many errors this way. The shift has to happen at mental level from I AM ALWAYS RIGHT to AM I RIGHT, so we do the right things, the right way