Biases and Heuristics in the American College Application Process and Potential Solutions

Abstract

Behavioral economics and the biases and heuristics it analyses has brought reasoning and motive to many economically irrational decisions in the world. But perhaps one of the most important problems to explore using the lens of biases and heuristics is the American college application process, specifically why top students from disadvantaged backgrounds do not apply to the top universities. The extensive and complex structure of the U.S. college application process presents students with many possible obstacles and biases. This paper investigates issues surrounding students from disadvantaged backgrounds and how biases and heuristics affect their decision of applying to top universities. These biases and heuristics include the status quo bias, the availability heuristic and the representativeness heuristic. A solution of changing the high school counselling system is proposed.