Ease-of-Retrieval as an Automatic Input in Judgments: A Mere-Accessibility Framework?

The ease-of-retrieval hypothesis suggests that people use the ease with which information comes to mind as a heuristic in forming judgments (Schwarz et al. 1991). We examine the automaticity of the use of ease-of-retrieval as an input in judgments. We demonstrate that the ease-of-retrieval is used unintentionally, outside of awareness, and effortlessly, along with other consciously applied inputs, to make related judgments. Once experienced, its impact follows through to judgments, even when it is discredited as a source of information. Results across four studies suggest that an automatic source of information (viz., the ease-of-retrieval) may merely have to be accessible to be used in a judgment. We propose a mere-accessibility framework as a variant of Feldman and Lynch's (1988) accessibility-diagnosticity framework to explain these results. Copyright 2003 by the University of Chicago.