? Heuristic of the Day: Numerosity Effect

Numerosity Effect (also called the Numerosity Heuristic) impacts how people think about numbers and units of measurement. Essentially, people are very susceptible to the effects of larger numbers and can fall prey to being distracted by unit manipulations.

As you might be thinking, Numerosity Effect can impact a range of thought processes–and many people use this to their advantage (e.g., marketers). If you are not leveraging the Numerosity Effect, don’t fall prey to it!

Numerosity Effect might be the result of hastened thinking. After all, it would be difficult to analyze every number we come across throughout our lives. But when making big, rare, or expensive decisions, it can be worth it to slow down and try to avoid the Numerosity Effect.

Go beyond the numbers and units. Ask yourself, are there any other variables that could be important?

Read more about Numerosity Effect at the Heuristics Science Insitute.

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