Conservatism vs. Anchoring

CFA Level III
#1

I think I understand the meaning of both, but have trouble discerning between the two when asked to identify them on an essay question. Does anyone have any good guidelines on when to answer that a bias is based on conservatism vs. Anchoring?

#2

Look for any explicit statements that help discerning. Conservatism is typically associated with focusing on the original information used in the analysis and not paying attention to the new information. Anchoring is associated with a forecast, typically and numerical value. Don’t know if this is gonna help. Since I have a lot to do, haven’t practiced questions yet.

#3

Conservatism: Individuals put more weights on the information to form the original forecast than the new information. Anchoring: Individuals anchor to the original forecast, which could be a target price or % change.

Both are cognitive errors…

#4

what exactly is the difference between " put more weight on" and " anchor to" – I guess that is the question the OP is asking.

Conservatism: In the light of new information - you do not accept them at all.

I had a 10% Earnings forecast for Company A. I have new information saying Company A has a new product which should cause it to show say a 15% forecast. I do not accept that new information and stick to my original 10% forecast. <

Anchoring: In the light of new information - you accept them, but say that your original was better - but needs a little adjustment. So some of the new information is taken in, but not to the extent that it really should have been.

I had a 10% Earnings forecast for Company A. I have new information saying Company A has a new product which should cause it to show say a 15% forecast. I accept the new information, but am still stuck to my original 10% estimate - but modify it a little bit - say 11%.

I hope I have gotten the distinction :slight_smile: (otherwise I need a lot of re-reading and not enough brain cells to keep all the information).

#5

These are both cognitive errors, but conservatism is a belief perserverance bias and Anchoring is a data processing bias.

I think of the difference this way:

For conservatism you preserve your original belief by putting too little wieght on new information(hence it is a belief preservation cognitive bias)

For Anchoring you have processed data incorrectly and put more (undue) weight on the original information (hence a data processing cognitive bias)

the difference has to do with what information you are weighting. Correct weight on original data, but too little weight on new data = conservatism bias. Too high of weight on original data, but new data is weighted correctly = anchoring bias.

#6

If this is related to Bayesian formula, can anyone describe the difference with the formula?

#7

Thanks for all the responses.