Did You Know?: Expectations bias distorts reality

Did You Know?: Expectations bias distorts reality describes how expectation bias shapes perception, interpretation, and memory by leading people to “see what they expect to see” rather than what is actually happening. The article explains that when expectations are strong, attention narrows toward familiar cues and people may miss signs that the situation has changed. It illustrates this with daily driving: on a well-known road, a driver might assume other vehicles will stay in their lane until an oncoming car heads toward them at high speed, creating a brief delay before recognizing the true threat. The piece links the concept to aviation safety, citing a final NTSB report on a January 2025 mid-air collision between American Airlines flight 5342 and a U.S. Army Sikorsky helicopter near Washington’s Reagan National Airport. It says radio interference, ambiguous visual cues, and lack of integrated traffic awareness likely reinforced expectation bias, contributing to a crash that killed 63 people.