Tim is 6 feet 4 inches, weighs 280 pounds, and is extremely strong, and athletic. He has excelled at sports throughout his whole life. Many people would guess that Tim is more likely to be a professional football player than a physician. Yet there are far more physicians than there are professional football players, and therefore statistically Tim is more likely to be a physician. The initial judgment that Tim is more likely to be a football player is based on __________.

Question

Quizplus · Accepted Answer

The initial judgment that Tim is more likely to be a football player is based on a representativeness heuristic, where people judge the probability of an event by how much it resembles what they consider to be a typical example of the event. In this case, Tim's physical characteristics and athletic background lead people to associate him with being a professional football player, which is a stereotypical example of someone with those attributes, rather than considering the statistical likelihood of any given profession.

Tim Is 6 Feet 4 Inches, Weighs 280 Pounds, and Is