I’d venture to suggest that for most people, most of the time, we have no idea if we are operating with confirmation bias or not.
The majority of people like to think that they make decisions rationally and objectively but the subconscious has extraordinary influence in our decision making. The fact that we are not aware of our confirmation bias is highlighted by the term “subconscious” i.e. it is below the level of consciousness.
Have a read of Predictably Irrational by Dan Ariely or a summary of it. It is mind boggling how much unconscious bias we operate from and this is especially prevalent when buying in a state of desire, which is surely what we are doing when purchasing espresso kit for our personal use.
Ask a 100 people if they think they are an above average driver and the vast majority will confidently tell you that indeed they are. Clearly, that is impossible.
Similarly, most people will tell you they are better than average at making decisions objectively, but it has been proven many times over that for the majority of buying decisions, we don’t.
And when it comes to espresso kit, confirmation bias may not matter. If you enjoy the result of your decision, confirmation bias or not, isn’t that what matters? It’s not like buying one espresso machine or the other, with or without confirmation bias, is like deciding whether to push the big shiny red nuclear launch button.
Footnote: it would be remiss me of me not to acknowledge the significant contribution that Confirmation Bias played in the writing of this post 😉