Reflection No. 2: The Cognitive Psychology Essentials for Cybersecurity Topic of Confirmation Bias
(Written in the Spring semester of 2022)
The topic of confirmation bias has shown that solutions to tackling confirmation bias by technology companies, especially through social media platforms where echo chambers are easily created, can be provided externally. However, solving the problem of echo chambers due to the influence of confirmation bias will still have to come with a great deal of personal responsibility through the user’s willingness to change his/her cognitive behavior. In doing so, an external solution is still going to be needed to create environmental conditions that help the user make that behavior change.
One solution could be to have an algorithm that focuses on categories of what a user likes based on his/her user profile instead of how many likes or views of content or responses to content he/she has completed. If all content presented was only based on content a user has liked, viewed, or responded to then he/she will get inundated with the same content of a specific category repeatedly, especially if it is all political news sources with a heavy bias to one side filled with misinformation. This ensures the user does not get worked up over repeated hits of the same political content through an echo chamber. And that he/she gets more diversification of content he/she likes to ensure the user comes back to the platform and the company does not lose users and money.
While it would be user-friendly to give the user the freedom to set his/her filters, he/she cannot be expected to change his/her behavior on his/her own if extreme cognitive bias takes root. Because many people rely on social media for informing others of events such as political rallies, from a cybersecurity perspective there is an obligation to society to ensure these events do not lead to riots, insurrections, and violence or the creation of hate groups that could be harmful to communities and civilizations if the creation of echo chambers get out of hand.