Awareness of anchoring: Intentional processes contribute to anchoring effects

Judgments and decisions are highly susceptible to influence from reference points. Anchoring effects arise when a benchmark is provided prior to estimation of a target quantity, and are observed even when the anchor is ostensibly shown to be randomly generated. It is commonly assumed that anchoring is automatic and unavoidable, but very little research has directly investigated this assumption. We report five studies aiming to characterize individuals' awareness of anchors and their effects. High proportions of participants indicated that knowing an anchor would improve their estimates (Studies 1 and 3), and desired to view an ostensibly random anchor - indicating that they would use it to inform their own absolute estimates (Study 2). Anchoring was stronger for participants who indicated that they intended to use (Studies 2 and 3) or reported having used (Study 5) the anchor value to inform their estimate. We also replicated and extended a previous demonstration that anchors have a reduced effect when they are judged to be poor estimates of the target quantity (Studies 1, 3, 4). Although anchoring was not eliminated in participants who reported that they did not intend to use the anchor, or judged it to be a poor estimate, the results overall suggest a substantial explanatory role for intention and awareness in the generation of anchoring effects.