Thinking in Bets: Making Smarter Decisions When You Don't Have All the Facts · chapter 2 · id thinking-in-bets-c2-05-motivated-reasoning----our-ten

“Motivated reasoning -- our tendency to seek out and interpret information in ways that confirm our existing beliefs -- was established by Ziva Kunda's landmark 1990 paper, which has been cited over 9,000 times.”

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Kunda (1990), 'The case for motivated reasoning,' Psychological Bulletin, 108(3), 480-498source alive

People are more likely to arrive at conclusions that they want to arrive at, but their ability to do so is constrained by their ability to construct seemingly reasonable justifications for these conclusions.

Psychology Today, 'Motivated Reasoning: A Brief History'source alive

Kunda's 1990 paper has been cited more than 9,000 times according to Google Scholar, with more than 1,000 citations since 2021.

ResearchGate (2024), 'Thirty Years since Kunda: Addressing Critiques to Reimagine a Model of Motivated Reasoning'paywalled — manual check queued

Thirty years after Kunda's foundational paper, motivated reasoning remains one of the most cited and debated concepts in social psychology.

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