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Psychological Phenomena

Probability Matching

Probability and Statistical Reasoning Biases

Probability matching is a decision strategy in which a person's predictions of which category something belongs to are made in proportion to how often each category actually occurs. For example, if positive cases make up 60 percent of a training set and negative cases make up 40 percent, someone using a probability-matching strategy will predict positive on about 60 percent of instances and negative on about 40 percent, rather than always predicting whichever category is most common.

Facts
Core Claim
In probability matching, a decision-maker predicts each outcome category at a rate proportional to how often that category actually occurs, rather than always predicting the most frequent category. 1
Classification
Type of Phenomenon
Cognitive Phenomenon 1
Connections

In Branch

Source Wikipedia: Probability Matching
Sources
1. Wikipedia: Probability Matching
Wikimedia Foundation
  • lead section
    Probability matching is a decision strategy in which predictions of class membership are proportional to the class base rates.
  • lead section, phenomenon-kind classification
    Probability matching is a decision strategy in which predictions of class membership are proportional to the class base rates.
  • In Branch: Cognitive Psychology, Categories
    Wikipedia article 'Probability matching' is filed under Category:Cognitive biases.
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