Halo Bias
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The Halo bias is the tendency for positive impressions of someone in one area / the past to positively influence one's opinion or feelings in other areas.
Let’s look at an example; think of your childhood friend who your parents just assumed was a nice person based on their initial interaction. They could do no wrong and when you were with them, you could be out later than usual etc.
However, you knew the truth about this person and how they were caught multiple times doing not so “nice” things. And even when presented with this evidence, your parents were still unable to come to terms with this person being wrong.
In this case, your parents are letting their first impression of your friend (positive) influence their view of them in other areas. Simply put, they are unable to fit this dissonance into the framework through which they view relationships - This is the Halo bias.
Halo @ Workplace
We’ve all had that one person in office who made the best of impressions with leadership in their first few weeks and continue to live off it.
In spite of not pulling their weight, they do not get a lot of slack because of their initial impression. This is the Halo bias in full effect.
The reverse is also true where someone starts off by making a bad impression and then has to work incredibly hard to compensate for that.
This person could go out of their way to be a good employee but they are always looked through lenses that were tainted by that first impression.
Neutralising Halo
The best way to neutralise the Halo bias is to build standardised systems of appraisal and feedback.
If there is a standard way of assessing someone’s performance without being influenced heavily by their past behaviour, then that should be the norm.
For example, a well designed standard IQ test won’t rely on someone’s past performance. What will matter is just their performance on that test.
The opposite is true when teachers grade their students, where the scores can be influenced by not just the current performance of the student but also the perception of the student’s past performance and behaviour.
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