People routinely infer causation from mere correlation
Cognitive science and psychological research consistently demonstrate that humans frequently commit errors by inferring direct causal connections from mere statistical correlations or coincidences.
The claim that people routinely infer causation from mere correlation is well-supported by psychological research on cognitive biases, illusory correlation, and causal attribution errors (e.g., Papers 1, 3, and 7). There are no retrieved papers refuting this well-established psychological tendency.
Leslie Zebrowitz McArthur. Illusory Causation and Illusory Correlation. 1980. https://doi.org/10.1177/014616728064003
Paper [1] discusses illusory causation and illusory correlation as established cognitive phenomena where perceivers misattribute causal links to salient stimuli.
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van der Wal RC, Sutton RM, Lange J, Braga JPN. Suspicious binds: Conspiracy thinking and tenuous perceptions of causal connections between co-occurring and spuriously correlated events.. 2018. https://doi.org/10.1002/ejsp.2507
Paper [3] demonstrates that individuals routinely impose causal meanings on spuriously correlated or random events, particularly in the context of conspiracy thinking.
Iudici A, Salvini A, Faccio E, Castelnuovo G. The Clinical Assessment in the Legal Field: An Empirical Study of Bias and Limitations in Forensic Expertise.. 2015. https://doi.org/10.3389/fpsyg.2015.01831
Paper [7] finds that systematic errors in attributing causality and making inferential leaps are widely prevalent in professional evaluations.
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