Cognitive Bias in Political Reasoning — Interactive Scenario Explorer¶
Learning Objective¶
Students will classify (Bloom L2 — Understand) examples of biased political reasoning as confirmation bias, motivated reasoning, availability heuristic, in-group favoritism, or anchoring, and apply (Bloom L3 — Apply) this knowledge to evaluate political arguments they encounter.
- Bloom Level: Apply (L3)
- Bloom Verb: Classify, Apply
- Library: p5.js
Specification¶
The full specification below is extracted from Chapter 9: "Chapter 9: Political Opinion, Media, and Civic Reasoning".
Type: MicroSim
**sim-id:** cognitive-bias-identifier<br/>
**Library:** p5.js<br/>
**Status:** Specified
**Learning objective:** Students will *classify* (Bloom L2 — Understand) examples of biased political reasoning as confirmation bias, motivated reasoning, availability heuristic, in-group favoritism, or anchoring, and *apply* (Bloom L3 — Apply) this knowledge to evaluate political arguments they encounter.
**Design:**
- A carousel of 8 short scenario cards (political reasoning vignettes, 2–3 sentences each)
- Example scenarios:
1. "When I heard the crime rate had dropped, I immediately looked for reasons the statistic might be wrong — because I believe crime is getting worse." → Confirmation bias / motivated reasoning
2. "I read about a recent terrorist attack and now I think terrorism is the #1 threat facing the country, even though car accidents kill far more Americans." → Availability heuristic
3. "I think my party's candidate's use of executive orders is normal and necessary, but the other party's candidate doing the same thing is a constitutional crisis." → In-group favoritism / motivated reasoning
4. "The pollster first told me the candidate was at 70%, so when they revised down to 52%, it still felt high." → Anchoring bias
- For each scenario, student clicks to identify the bias from a drop-down list
- After answering, the card flips to reveal the correct bias and a one-paragraph explanation of how it operates in political contexts
- Score tracked at top; final screen shows "X of 8 correct" with review option
- Canvas: 600px × 400px; responsive