People unconsciously ignore their own opinions and adopt the perceived popular choice.

Ex. Steelers, Cowboys, Yankees, Notre Dame & the Lakers are so popular because they're popular winners

Our senses don't operate in isolation. They contaminate each other, fooling our brains.

Ex. Seeing a single flash on a computer while hearing 2 beeps, your brain makes you think there was 2 flashes (McGurk)

Is the tendency to overestimate one's achievements and capabilities in relation to others

Ex. 95% of men believe they're in the upper 50% athletic 

90% of Americans belive they're in the upper 50% attractive.

Assess your OWN strengths and weaknesses as well as others

Our brains don't like uncertainty. 

The brain searches for 1 dominant trait then quickly assigns others traits

(Ex. Physically attractive people are belived to be friendly, outgoing, and trustworthy)

When 1 of those buried ideas are moved to the forefront of our thinking by the mentioning of an idea

(Ex. Reminding Stanford U black students their race before ACT decreased scores

Perceptions aren't stable. They can be altered by pre-information that changes our judgement.

(Ex. Teen girls rate themselves as fatter after looking at fashion magazines)

When aware of both positive and negative, we tend to over consider the negative

(Ex. Interviewers are likely to reject candidates who reveal any negative info)

We all have expectations about life and these expectations distort the way we interpret the objective world.

(Ex. If I expect John to be an "A" student, I will interpret his work to be smarter)

We are all born with diferent baselines of happiness but regardless, we overestimate the impact of winning vs. losing

(Ex. Money doesn't buy happiness and you will survive tragedy and be happy again)

We irrationally prefer avoiding loss about twice as much as acquiring gains

(Ex. Motivation tool. 100$ for quitting vc. losing 100$. 30% more success with those that may lose)

The failure to notice fully-visible, but unexpected objects because attention was invested elsewhere because primary attention leaves little for 2nd order tasks

(Ex. Texting students saw clown 8% of the time while walking across campus

We remember the first and as things we perceive.

(Ex. Start with a well-rehearsed statement in an interview. Be interviewed on a nice day and go in first sequence)

The tendency to search for and remember information that confirms our already held beliefs. 

(Ex. If given 10 facts for both sides, we rememer 7 facts that support and 3-5 that challenge)

Humans are driven to divide their world into binary groups which overly simplifies and distorts how we perceive

(Ex. Racism being perceived as pure black vs. pure white even though there are thousands of shades)

People guess their own beliefs and actions to be more prevalent/normal

(Ex. Smokers and sexually active people thinking its normal to stick to their habit)

3.5 years old, the hippocampus develops. Our first memories are visual and positive

(Ex. Our most vivid memories are between the ages of 15 & 25)