Chapter 12: Judgement, Decision Making, and Reasoning Flashcards
what is judgement?
assumption made about a characteristic
“he isn’t athletic or good enough”
what is reasoning?
process of drawing a logical conclusions of the judgement
what is decision making?
the process of choosing between alternatives
what do we rely on to make quick judgements
experience
what is a representative heuristic
an instance that resembles a category is seen as a likely member of that category
what is a heuristic?
common guidelines that save us time when making decisions
used for quick decisions
ex. I don’t eat seafood at buffets
I always get gat at 1/4 of a tank
I always buy the generic medicine
what is an example of a representative heuristic
1: Are we talking about a librarian or a farmer?
a man wears glasses, speaks quietly, and reads a lot
we probably will interpret him as a librarian even though statistically it is more likely he is a farmer
2: A Centre student is wearing a Vermont hat, so we assume they are most likely from Vermont, even though statistically it’s more likely they’re from Kentucky
what are illusionary correlations
connections between two things that don’t really exist
representative heuristics rely on…
stereotypes
what is a base rate?
the numerical odds that something is X category
the actual proportion of the population
ex. -there are 20x more male farmers than male librarians
-a Centre student is 500x more likely to be from Kentucky than Vermont
what is the availability heuristic?
events that come to mind easier are judged as more probably
- if it comes to mind, we must have had exposure to it (see abt/hear abt)
- If we have exposure to it, it must be common
what is an illustrative example of the availability heuristic?
you ask two people is homelessness is an issue in the US. Person 1 is from North Dakota and Person 2 is from Washington D.C.
Person 1 is going t say no because there isn’t a very large homeless population in N.D. therefore they aren’t exposed to it, but Person 2 is going to think it’s a huge issue because they see it all the time.
Lichtenstein (1978)
Participants judged lethal events
-58% viewed tornados as mor dangerous than asthma even though asthma is 20x more deadly
-83% viewed pregnancy as more dangerous than appendicitis even though appendicitis is 2x more deadly
the biggest predictors of risk are:
-someone you knew died (r=.90)
-someone you heard of died (r=.85)
-someone you knew was injured (r=.52)
tornados and pregnancy are very news worthy events, asthma and appendicitis are not
when we add these events together :
have experience + know someone + heard of someone = very common
as a result we have a poor judgement of actual base rates
ex. YA cancer rates
what are the 4 main things we use to make decisions
- expected utility
- personality and emotions
- context
- presentation
expected utility in decision making
aka investment
if given all possible information, decisions should be rational
(the choice that results in gaining the most X)
but…people are not rational
(ex. gambling)
Denes-Raj (1994)
participants gambled $1 for a chance to win $7 if they pulled a red jellybean
(they could bet a total of 5 times)
choose 1 of 2 scenarios;
1. one red in a bowl of white
2. 7 red in a bowl of 93 white
1 red in a bowl of 9:
-10 in 100 (higher utility)
-only 15% choose this option every time
7 red in a bowl of 93
-7 in 100 (lower utility)
-85% chose this option at lease once
-75 chose this option everytime
shows that people do not always act rationally
personality and emotion in decision making
some people naturally take more risks
(optimistic v. pessimistic prediction of outcome)
influenced by current mood
(incidental emotions and expected emotions)
