A closer look
Horn effect is a cognitive bias that causes one's perception of another person to be unduly influenced by a single negative trait, leading to an unfairly harsh assessment of their overall character and capabilities; if you mispronounce a single word in a meeting or spill coffee on your shirt, everyone in the room will immediately, subconsciously decide that you are entirely incompetent and probably cheat on your taxes, showing that we are incredibly swift to write off complex, multidimensional human beings based on one minor, insignificant misstep because nuanced judgment requires way too much cognitive effort, meaning first impressions are terrifyingly permanent simply because our brains love a convenient negative stereotype
