Learning facts without first considering what they could be can lead to hindsight bias. How might this impact (a)memory and (b) understanding of novel topics? Foresight participants read about five psychology studies, including meanperformance of one group; then they estimated the mean performance of another group and stated causes for the difference;finally, they received the second group’s actual performance. Hindsight participants learned about both groups’ performance atthe beginning, then imagined what estimates and causes they would have indicated had they not seen actual means. A weeklater, half of each group recalled the means they had learned, and other half estimated means for a novel set of studies. Weconsidered the extent to which: 1. foresight promotes long-term memories as opposed to providing an anchor that biasesmemories; 2. foresight cultivates a habit of considering alternative possible outcomes that might help one understand noveltopics.

In hindsight bias, upon learning an outcome, one is overly confident that one would have “known it all along.”Several researchers have been able to neutralize hindsight bias by prompting participants to consider alternative outcomes,but can we learn to avoid bias for novel outcomes, without prompting? Foresight participants read brief summaries of fivepsychology studies, and learned the mean performance of one group in each study. They estimated the other group’s perfor-mance—reflecting their sense of the effect size—stated possible causes, and then learned the other group’s mean performance.Hindsight participants learned both groups’ mean performance at the outset, then indicated what they would have estimated.We asked whether (1) participants would show superior estimation and/or consideration of alternative causes for novel stimulione week later, and (2) whether Foresight participants would benefit more given the feedback they received on the accuracy oftheir estimates.