My Lucky Pants

The Impact of Cognitive Biases in Sport

Sport — jam-packed as it is with decisions, judgements and predictions, usually made under significant pressure — is the perfect environment for cognitive biases to flourish. If we are to better understand sport, we must better understand why, how and in what circumstances these biases and other thinking oddities operate.

In so doing, we will learn why…

• the decisions of match officials ARE inherently biased
• pundits are so bad at making predictions
• sporting form can appear and disappear in an instant
• people behave differently in crowds
• managers are sacked at the drop of a hat
• we bet too much on underdogs and too little on favourites
• we support ‘bad’ teams
• we believe our ‘lucky pants’ are lucky

Football (soccer) and cricket take centre stage here, but the lessons are wide-ranging.