When constructing the timeline for a postmortem report, starting it before the incident helps to avoid which bias?

Starting the timeline for a postmortem report before the incident is essential in mitigating hindsight bias. Hindsight bias refers to the tendency to see events as having been predictable after they have already occurred. When a timeline begins at the moment of the incident, it can lead to conclusions that the outcomes were obvious and that the actions that should have been taken were clear all along.

By constructing the timeline from before the incident, the focus shifts to the context and decisions made at that point in time, rather than allowing the knowledge of the outcome to color the understanding of earlier events. This approach fosters a more objective analysis, emphasizing the complexity of the situation as it was perceived at the time, rather than simplifying it in hindsight.

In contrast, confirmation bias, fundamental attribution error, and negativity bias are related to different cognitive influences that affect how people interpret events, but they wouldn’t be directly addressed by starting the timeline earlier in the incident analysis. Confirmation bias involves favoring information that confirms existing beliefs, fundamental attribution error relates to misjudging the reasons behind others' actions as opposed to situational factors, and negativity bias refers to the tendency to focus on negative outcomes more than positive ones. These biases do not specifically relate to the retrospective evaluation of events that hindsight