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The Baader-Meinhof phenomenon refers to the brain’s tendency to look for patterns.

Selective attention can be utilized in pessimistic or optimistic ways.

Neuroplasticity means we can change how we take in and interact with the world.

Most of us have likely had the experience of learning something new and then suddenly seeing it everywhere. When a friend spoke about an appliance I hadn’t heard of before, I suddenly saw it in others’ kitchens and heard people raving about it. Or when my book club read about Enneagram personality typing, I started to see various books on the topic and hear numerous people referencing their type. It seemed like there was suddenly an uptick in frequency, but really, my brain was just more aware of instances all around me.

This type of experience is called the Baader-Meinhof phenomenon, the frequency illusion, which is the brain’s proclivity toward looking for patterns. When we learn something new, we unconsciously scan our world for matches and are alerted to confirmations. When we discover a new word, name, or product, we then seem to come across it more frequently. We are primed, pay attention, and see it “everywhere.” Psychologists might refer to this as combining two common cognitive tendencies: selective attention (focusing our attention on something) and confirmation bias (feeling confirmed in an idea when it is seen more frequently).

This is not the same experience as researching something on our phone or computer one day and then being inundated with ads for that merchandise or experience in the weeks that follow. That is related to those clever (and somewhat unsettling) marketing algorithms that know when we have investigated something and then attempt to pull us back into purchasing the specific thing. But marketing does lean on this frequency phenomenon somewhat, using those browsing habits of ours and then reinforcing something, as we apparently do tend to be pulled to purchase if we see something more often or feel that it might indeed be a popular item.

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