Which of the following is an example of a cognitive bias that affects memory?

Hindsight bias is a cognitive bias that influences how we perceive our memories of past events, leading us to believe that we “knew it all along” after an event has occurred. This bias can distort our recollection of events, making us feel more confident in our predictions or judgments after we know the outcome, even if we didn’t actually predict it.

For instance, if a person reads about a political event and later hears about the election result, they might recall feeling certain about that outcome all along, even if they had expressed doubt prior to the event. This phenomenon illustrates how our memories can be reshaped by our current knowledge, affecting our understanding of our own thought processes and decisions.

The other options represent different psychological concepts that do not specifically relate to biases affecting memory. Emotional regulation deals with how we manage and respond to emotional experiences, social facilitation pertains to the tendency to perform differently in the presence of others, and cognitive dissonance relates to the mental conflict that occurs when a person holds two or more contradictory beliefs, values, or ideas. These concepts do not directly illustrate how memory itself can be biased, making hindsight bias the correct choice in this context.