Sep 22, 2013
saliency bias
Our habit of forming memories around jarring events rather than, say, a series of minor incidents whose impact nets about equal. This mechanism explains how and why history can link a generation’s implosion to one day at the end of the decade. “Big, dramatic events, such as explosions, gun battles, and natural disasters, stick in our heads and stay there, undermining our ability to think objectively about things like causation, probabilities, and death rates.” From: The Saliency Bias and 9/11: Is America Recovering? by John Cassidy