This is a Lexicon entry: the mechanism, when it shows up, and the countermeasure. The full correction, with real-world cases and the audit prompt, hasn't been written yet.
Definition
The tendency for sensory states inside the body - hunger, fatigue, pain - to influence judgments about entirely unrelated external matters. Judges grant parole more often after eating.
When it shows up
Judgments made by tired, hungry or uncomfortable evaluators: parole boards, job interviewers, graders. Any setting where physiological state affects unrelated decisions.
Failure mode
Internal bodily states leak into judgments about external matters. Judges grant parole more often after meals; graders mark more harshly when hungry. The state contamination is invisible to the judge experiencing it.
Countermeasure
If you're making consequential judgments, check your physiological state first: eaten, rested, not in pain. If not, defer the judgment. Knowing about the effect doesn't prevent it; managing the state does.
Related traps
Also connected in the mapThe Affect Heuristic·3 more, locked
Credit & first seen
DiscoveredPopularized by Danziger, Levav and Avnaim-Pesso (2011); the broader phenomenon studied as 'interoceptive bias' in cognitive neuroscience. source ↗
Read next
Entry #138 of 631 in The Lexicon · see the full Lexicon