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The fallacy of the single cause, also known as complex cause, causal oversimplification, [1] causal reductionism, root cause fallacy, and reduction fallacy, [2] is an informal fallacy of questionable cause that occurs when it is assumed that there is a single, simple cause of an outcome when in reality it may have been caused by a number of only jointly sufficient causes.
It asserts that X causes Y when in reality, both X and Y are caused by Z. It is a variation on the post hoc ergo propter hoc fallacy and a member of the questionable cause group of fallacies. All of those examples deal with a lurking variable, which is simply a hidden third variable that affects both of the variables observed to be correlated.
The questionable cause—also known as causal fallacy, false cause, or non causa pro causa ("non-cause for cause" in Latin)—is a category of informal fallacies in which the cause or causes is/are incorrectly identified. In other words, it is a fallacy of reaching a conclusion that one thing caused another, simply because they are regularly ...
Escalation of commitment, irrational escalation, or sunk cost fallacy, where people justify increased investment in a decision, based on the cumulative prior investment, despite new evidence suggesting that the decision was probably wrong. G. I. Joe fallacy, the tendency to think that knowing about cognitive bias is enough to overcome it. [66]
Attribution (psychology) – Process by which individuals explain causes of behavior and events; Fallacy of the single cause – Assumption of a single cause where multiple factors may be necessary; Causality – How one process influences another; Cognitive dissonance – Stress from contradiction between beliefs and actions
Fallacy of the single cause (causal oversimplification [60]) – it is assumed that there is one, simple cause of an outcome when in reality it may have been caused by a number of only jointly sufficient causes. Furtive fallacy – outcomes are asserted to have been caused by the malfeasance of decision makers.
Causal reasoning is the process of identifying causality: the relationship between a cause and its effect.The study of causality extends from ancient philosophy to contemporary neuropsychology; assumptions about the nature of causality may be shown to be functions of a previous event preceding a later one.
Inferences can occur spontaneously if the behavior implies a situational or dispositional inference, while causal attributions occur much more slowly. [41] It has also been suggested that correspondence inferences and causal attributions are elicited by different mechanisms.