19 - Decision Making and Treatment Choices Flashcards
How do people make decisions?
Limited capacity for conscious attention, makes unconscious judgements about what to attend to
Only the info processed will form the person’s representation of the world out there
Decision making = complex process, put together a lot of components – goals, options, attributes, values, risks, outcome
What is attention focused by?
Cues - external and internal (experience, value, sensation, other people).
What is a decision?
Decision = choice of action between option
What can decision outcomes be?
- Satisfactory (good/happy)
- Unsatisfactory (bad/regret)
What are the different types of decisions?
- Certain - get an outcome (riskless)
- Uncertain - chance get/not get the outcome (risk unknown)
- Risky - chance get/not get the outcome (risk known)
What is the classical decision theory?
Subjective expected utility theory (sEUT)
What is the purpose of sEUT?
Normative theory - how people should make decisions
- Links choice with values, probability of each option.
- Based on mathematical axioms/ rules of logic
Who came up with sEUT?
von Neumann and Morgenstern
How is a rational decision made?
- Choice based on evaluating all options’ expected utility (EU)
- You choose the option with greatest or max value
MEU = EUa - EUb
The MEU option is the ‘correct’, ‘accurate’ or ‘rational’ choice.
What are the outcomes for not testing for Down Syndrome?
- Miscarriage
- Baby with DS
- Baby without DS
(Usual care)
What are the outcomes for testing for Down Syndrome?
- Miscarriage
- Baby with DS
- Baby without DS
(Choice-termination)
What are the assumptions for rational decision making?
- People are motivated to follow rules or axioms.
- People have complete knowledge of all options.
- People’s representations of options, risk and benefits are accurate.
- People’s know what their values are.
- People’s values are stable.
What conclusion did Simon draw about rational decision making?
‘Satisficing’
People don’t have processing capacity to calculate EUT.
People use simpler, less effortful strategies: choose ‘satisfactory’ criterion, and first matching option, e.g. need 5 rooms, choose 1st house with 5 rooms.
What is ‘elimination by aspects’ and who came up with it?
Tversky
Choose an attribute and make trade-offs between options, e.g. compare all houses with 5 rooms.
What is ‘heuristic’ and who came up with it?
Chaiken
Use a rule of thumb, not option information, e.g. friend said X, I’ve done it before.