Ever notice how some of those you work with only see certain things, kind of like selective hearing, but it is selective seeing and knowing?

There is a fancy word for it, The Confirmation Trap.  We all do it, our brains are wired that way, according to Eduardo deBono a neurologist and author of many books on how to think differently, how to jar yourself out of your usual ways of thinking.

“So what?” you might ask.  “I like the way I think, how I analyze things, even data I pay attention to.”  Well, the reason to be on the alert is that how you make judgments effects how you make decisions.  And, the cost of an ill informed decision is impossible to estimate.  One of the reasons that workplace learning and organizational learning, inservice and training are so important in health care is because it helps us acquire new concepts, new ways to interpret information and data, new ways to make sense in the world.

The confirmation trap is a tendency to seek data or information that conforms and reinforces how I see the world, my perspective and beliefs.  If you are interested in this, read the work of Peter Wason in 1960.  He also called it, myside bias.  We all do it, we remember only parts of things that conform and reinforce my views.  When planning, the confirmation bias also limits the kind of contingencies I might include or the scenarios that I can predict.  I can become overly confident in my beliefs because I have been so selective with what information I take in and remember – I can easily be broadsided.

How can you protect against it?  One is include outsiders in your planning.  Invite cross continuum partners to the table, hospital, physicians, nursing homes, patients, especially patients.  Outsiders can ask the “dumb” questions, the questions that are not informed by a lifetime of working in home health.  Dr. Deming once said, “Profound knowledge comes from the outside and by invitation only.”

What else can you do?  Be diligent and curious about the perspective of others.  Seek out their reactions, their views.  Have them look at the problem you are concerned with, the data you collect and how you make sense of things.  Look purposefully for disconfirming data.  Try to prove yourself wrong, you might learn more.  If you do these things then surely, you will get a richer view of your situation and make better decisions.

Jane Taylor, CHAMP Quality Improvement Advisor