Maslow's Hammer
Category
Problem-Solving
Also Known As...
Law of the Instrument Golden HammerSimilar
Functional FixednessDefinition
The over-reliance on a particular tool simply because that tool is either more immediately available or because it's more familiar.Origin
"If all you have is a hammer, everything looks like a nail," is a an aphorism from Abraham Maslow's The Psychology of Science, published in 1966.