Avoiding information and its relationship to confirmation bias

Abstract

The current research aims at identifying information avoidance and confirmation bias among university students based on gender connotation as well as the nature of the correlation between information avoidance and confirmation bias and the extent to which confirmatory bias contributes to the avoidance of information. The current research sample consisted of 400 students, 200 male students, and 200 female students, selected from three colleges randomly. To achieve the objectives of the current research, Kate Sweeney’s Information Avoidance theoretical model (2010) was relied on to explain information avoidance, and Tagfel’s social categorization theory (1976) to explain confirmation bias. The researcher also prepared an information avoidance scale after reviewing the approved theory and previous studies, and a confirmatory bias scale after reviewing the approved theory and previous studies. The researcher analyzed the paragraphs on the research scale according to two methods (the two extreme groups as well as the method of internal consistency). The reliability coefficient of the information avoidance scale using the re-test method was (0.81), and the reliability coefficient of the Cronbach's alpha method was (0.68), while the reliability coefficient of the confirmatory bias scale was (0.74), and it reached the Cronbach's alpha method (0.78). The current research reached the following results