Mental Models and Learning: The Case of Base-Rate Neglect

We experimentally document persistence of suboptimal behavior despite ample opportunities to learn from feedback in a canonical updating problem where people suffer from base-rate neglect. Our results provide insights on the mechanisms hindering learning from feedback. Importantly, our results suggest mistakes are more likely to be persistent when they are driven by incorrect mental models that miss or misrepresent important aspects of the environment. Such models induce confidence in initial answers, limiting engagement with and learning from feedback. We substantiate these insights in an alternative scenario where individuals involved in a voting problem overlook the importance of being pivotal. (JEL D83, D91)

• Publication year

  2024

• Venue

  The American Economic Review

• Publication date

  2024-03-01

• Fields of study

  Not labeled

• Identifiers
  DOI 10.1257/aer.20201004
• External record

  Open on Semantic Scholar

• Source metadata

  Semantic Scholar

• No claims are published for this paper.

• No concepts are published for this paper.

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