Mental models are a way of explaining how things work. Throughout our lives, we build up a personal collection of mental models to understand the world around us.
Mental models aren't perfect but developing a rich toolbox of them can be useful in navigating the complexities of life. Learning to intuitively apply the right models in the right situations is something we develop with practice.
This website is a curated collection of models with broad applicability in everyday life. There’s a focus on brief descriptions and simple, real life examples of the models in use.
Weekly Mental Model
Recency Bias
We tend to place greater emphasis on recent events over past ones.Description
Events that have occurred recently tend to be seen as more important than historic events. This is often just because the event is fresh in our memory as opposed to its actual importance. Given that the perceived importance of recent events will likely drop with time, recency-bias can lead to skewed perceptions and poor decision-making.
Examples
Employee reviews are prone to recency bias. The performance of work done most recently will disproportionally impact the final review.
In Law, the closing argument given by the defense is seen to have an advantage as it's the freshest in the jury's memory.