Concept · Cognitive Bias: Economic and consumer biases
Projection bias
Origin: Loewenstein, O'Donoghue & Rabin, 2003
Biological Parallel
A satiated python won't hunt for weeks; a hungry python strikes at anything. Neither can accurately predict its future preferences across metabolic states—the fed snake can't simulate hunger, the starving snake can't imagine satiation. This state-dependent blindness is universal: current physiology dominates prediction. Projection bias mirrors this: we grocery shop hungry and overbuy, or commit to morning runs while evening-tired, because our brains evolved in bodies where current state was the most reliable predictor of future state.