That Neuroscience Guy - The Neuroscience of Making Stupid Decisions

Episode Date: May 12, 2026

In today's episode of That Neuroscience Guy, we discuss the neuroscience behind cognitive biases that cause you to make bad decisions. 

My name is Olive Craig Olson, and I'm a neuroscientist at the University of Victoria. And in my spare time, I'm that neuroscience guy. Welcome to the podcast. Have you ever tried to make what should have been a simple decision and somehow made it worse at every step? Maybe you were choosing between a few options. At first, it felt straightforward. But then there were more options and more comparisons, and suddenly it didn't feel simple anymore. Then you came across a number, maybe a price.

maybe a benchmark, and it stuck in your head. Then someone described the exact same choice in a different way, and it suddenly felt riskier or safer, even though nothing actually changed. And even when things started going wrong, you kept going anyway. At first it felt reasonable, but somehow you ended up in the wrong place.

So what happened? On this episode, we're going to talk about why good decisions go bad and how multiple biases quietly stacked together in the brain. Let's walk through how this unfolds. It usually starts with something that feels like an advantage. Choice. You're presented with options. Maybe it's five.

Maybe it's 10. Maybe it's more. But choice feels like an advantage. Intuitively, it feels like a good thing. More choice means more freedom, more control, a better chance of finding the right answer. But your brain doesn't actually experience it that way. As the number of options increase, your prefrontal cortex,

the system responsible for evaluating choices, has more and more information to process. At the same time, another brain system, the anterior cingulate cortex, starts monitoring for conflict. And as the comparisons increase, so does the conflict. Now, instead of clarity, you feel tension, you feel uncertainty, you feel cognitive strain. This is known as the paradox of choice. Beyond a certain point, more options don't improve decisions.

They degrade them. You become slower, less confident, and often less satisfied with whatever you choose. and in that state, when the brain is overloaded, it starts looking for shortcuts. That's where the next bias enters. At some point in the early decision process, you encounter a number. Maybe it's the original price of something. Maybe it's an estimate. Maybe it's just a number someone mentioned in passing.

Whatever it is, your brain locks onto it. And from that moment forward, everything is evaluated relative to that number. This is the anchoring bias. Even if the number is arbitrary, even if it's irrelevant, it still influences your judgment. Because your brain prefers adjusting from a reference point rather than building a judgment from scratch. So instead of asking, what is this actually worth? You start asking, how does this compare to that first number? And those adjustments are almost always too small.

So now your decision is no longer neutral. It's already being pulled in a direction and you don't even realize it. Then something happens. The same information is presented again, but in a slightly different way. Instead of being framed as a gain, it's framed as a loss. Or instead of emphasizing what you get, it emphasizes what you might lose. Objectively, nothing has changed. but your brain reacts as if it has.

This is the framing effect. Different wording creates different emotional responses. And those emotional signals feed directly into how your brain evaluates value. So something framed as a gain feels safer. Something framed as a loss feels riskier, even if the numbers are identical. So you think about where you are in this decision. You started with too many options. Your thinking got anchored early.

Your perception was shaped by framing. And eventually you made a choice. At that moment, it feels like you've resolved the uncertainty. But what happens next is just as important. Because once you've made a decision, you start investing in it. Time, energy, attention, sometimes money. In the moment you invest something, your brain changes how to value. the situation. Now walking away doesn't feel natural. It feels like losing what you've already put in,

even though rationally that investment is already gone. This is the sunk cost fallacy. Instead of asking, what's the best decision right now, you start asking, how do I avoid wasting what I've already spent? And that shift is subtle, but it's powerful because it keeps you locked onto a even when the evidence suggests you should change course. You keep going. Not because it's the best option, but because stopping feels like a loss, and the brain is wired to avoid losses.

So now you're no longer making a forward-looking decision. You're protecting the past. And that's how the trap closes. What's important here is not just that these biases exist. It's that they don't happen in ice-stop. They happen in a sequence. Each one nudges you slightly off course. Too many options overload the system.

Anchors pull your judgment. Framing shapes your perception. And sunk cost keeps you committed. Individually, each effect is small, but together they compound until eventually the decision you have made, feels completely rational, even though it's not aligned with what actually makes sense. So what can we do about it? The first step is awareness, not in a vague sense, but in a very

practical way. When you're making a decision, pause and ask, are there too many options here? You might have experienced this one when traveling. You go to a new city. You know, I go to London, England a lot. And when you go to any part of London and you want to go to a restaurant or a pub, there are literally too many options. And it ends up degrading your decision. Did something early on anchor my thinking? Same situation. Downtown London. You might have seen a pub with a great name right at the start. Not every meet inside. There's one called the Sherlock Holmes. I think it's a fantastic name, but that might be anchoring my thinking. Is it being framed in a way that's influencing how it feels?

You know, a classic on the London pub scene, if we stick with that, is oldest pub in England. There are so many oldest pubs in England, but it's framing it in a way. It doesn't matter what it looks like. It could look like the worst place in the world, but it's framed in a way that's influencing how it feels. And am I continuing just because I already invested in it?

Let's say you go into the oldest pub in England, and it is really bad once you're inside. It's not a nice place. It smells bad. The people there look a little bit sketchy. And you stay because you've invested. You don't get up and go to a different pub. You stay because of the sunk cost fallacy. These questions don't limit bias.

And I'll just review them one last time. are there too many options here? Did something early on anchor my thinking? Is this being framed in a way that's influencing how it feels? And am I continuing just because I've already invested in it? These questions, like I just said, don't eliminate the bias, but they interrupt it. And sometimes that's enough to change the outcome. Because better decisions don't come from trying harder.

They come from seeing more clearly from separating what has already happen from what actually happens next. And remembering that the only thing you can control is the next step. Not the time you've already spent, not the money that's already gone, not the effort you've already invested, just the decision in front of you. So the next time something feels harder than it should, it might not be the decision itself. It might be the way your brain is processing it. And if you can see that, you can start to take control of it. Hopefully you like this little review of these biases that bias your decisions. And hopefully that can be action information for you when you make your next decision. Now, don't forget our website,

that neuroscience guy.com. There is the link to the Etsy store, right? We have merch. There's links to Patreon, thank you so much to the people that support us that way. Check it out, Google it, use AI, find out what Patreon is. Remember, even a dollar a week helps graduate students in the Krig Olson Lab. Check out our Instagram at that Neuroside guy and X in Threads at that Neurosag Guy. We want to know what you want to know about the neuroscience of daily life. And last but not least, the podcast. Thank you so much for listening.

and if you haven't already, please subscribe. And don't forget to check out 60 seconds in neuroscience. It's on Spotify and Apple. Now, I'm Olive Craig Olson, and I'm that neuroscience guy. Thank you so much for listening, and I'll see you soon for another full episode of the podcast.