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Belief bias is a cognitive bias in which one's assessment of the logical strength of an argument is influenced by one's beliefs and/or everyday knowledge, which affects the ability to evaluate the nature (i.e. true or false) of the conclusion. It is different than confirmation bias in several distinct ways. While confirmation bias affirms a pre-existing belief through an intentional action (i.e. actively searching for evidence to substantiate one's own belief), belief bias is an unintentional, subconscious action that is influenced by everyday knowledge (i.e. driving the speed limit to avoid speeding tickets). Reactions to contradictory claims are also different for each bias. For example, claims that do not confirm pre-existing beliefs are actively ignored in confirmation bias, while in belief bias they are subconsciously seen as invalid.

Overview: Daily application
Beliefs factor into everyday life in that they are constantly being created and updated on a daily basis. People use their beliefs and pre-existing knowledge about events to activate heuristics and stereotypes to facilitate the decision-making process. A common example may be the use of expectations. For example, people who stop at a red light expect to avoid accidents and also expect that at some point the light will turn green. Likewise, when students put the effort into studying the material, they expect to do well. When expectations are violated, people may change their beliefs, and when their expectations are validated, their belief system stays the same.

Walker Percy published a collection of essays entitled The Message in the Bottle, in which appeared Loss of the Creature, where Percy introduces the idea of a "symbolic complex". This complex suggests that people are unable to experience any object as totally new because they will always have preconceived notions and associations with which they can compare the object. These preconceived notions and associations are constantly being updated either by being validated or by being violated, and are one of the primary, unconscious driving forces that enable people to act.

Belief bias is a common tendency among people, as they often rely on their everyday knowledge and previous experiences to guide them through their daily activities. It is an unconscious and automatic mental process that allows individuals to categorize. This reduces the diversity of the physical world, enabling people to reason by inference. Researchers and psychologists have shown that because of belief bias’ automatic nature, it makes prejudice and stereotypes inevitable consequences.

Reasoning
Belief bias is independent of reasoning, as it does not enhance or hinder one's actual ability to infer, deduce, or conclude a point based on observations or theories. In regards to belief bias, reasoning may be done either inductively, by reasoning through inference, or deductively, by reasoning through logic.

Inductive Reasoning
Inductive reasoning and belief bias are directly linked, as people use their beliefs intuitively to make conclusions. For example, if one has a headache, one might deduce that it is because they are dehydrated as they haven't had anything to drink that day. Perhaps there is loud music playing, or they have spent too much time staring at a computer screen. People make these sorts of conclusions everyday. They serve to assist people in making decisions about which actions to take. If the person is indeed dehydrated, they can drink some water or electrolyte-infused liquid. If there is loud music playing, they can leave and go some place quieter. If they have been staring at a computer screen, they can go for a walk. If none of these reasons are the case, they can take a pain killer like tylenol or advil or consult a doctor.

Deductive Reasoning
With regards to deductive reasoning, studies have shown that belief bias frequently negatively influences individuals’ ability to perform well on deductive reasoning tasks by forcing errors based on prior knowledge. For example, consider the following syllogism:

No addictive things are inexpensive. Some cigarettes are inexpensive. Therefore, some cigarettes are not addictive Belief bias can inhibit a person from saying this statement is logically valid because it is counterfactual—cigarettes are, in fact, addictive. However, if rearranged to side with everyday knowledge, people may have an easier time accepting the conclusion. Take the following example, which is equally valid:

No cigarettes are inexpensive. Some addictive things are inexpensive. Therefore, some addictive things are not cigarettes This statement may be seen as valid not because of logical reasoning, but because it is substantiated by a person's belief that there are other substances besides cigarettes that are addictive. It is interesting to note that valid statements with believable conclusions (as in the second example) are accepted 96% of the time, while valid statements with unbelievable conclusions (as in the first example) are only accepted 46% of the time, demonstrating the profound effect of belief bias.

Inhibitory Control
Recent studies have begun to show that the executive function of inhibitory control may serve a big role in controlling belief bias. By actively inhibiting inappropriate responses (i.e. misleading strategies), individuals can re-represent the information in a more logical way (such as replacing words with symbols). Findings demonstrate that the better people are at inhibiting belief bias, the more successful they become in deductive reasoning tasks. These findings also suggest that education should train students to inhibit belief bias by encouraging “critical thinking independent of their own knowledge and beliefs”.

Biological Evidence
Tests using fMRI showed the neuroanatomical differences in reasoning with and without belief bias, through belief-neutral and belief-laden tasks. In belief-neutral reasoning, participants were presented with syllogisms that portrayed arbitrary content (i.e. All A are B, All B are C, therefore All A are C). This activated the upper parietal lobe, a region involved in mathematical reasoning and spatial representation. In belief-laden reasoning, participants were presented with syllogisms that portrayed knowledge-based content (i.e. All apples are red fruit, all red fruit are poisonous). This activated the front left temporal lobe, a region involved in the retrieval and selecting of facts from long-term memory. These findings demonstrate that when individuals are presented with non-arbitrary content, they have a tendency to reason using memory rather than logic.