I do like it when I find a juicy popular science piece to post, and Newsweek is often a good source. I found this today, summarising research that shows people often make the best decisions based on limited information. In other words, they trust their gut. In fact, what they are doing is instinctively honing in on the important bits of information, and screening out the rest. So much so, that researchers have found little additional benefit in using complex computerised statistical analysis to process information and make choices.
These days we are overloaded with information. No doubt many will find it reassuring to learn that following one's instinct is still a good bet.
Thursday, November 22, 2007
Day Forty-Two: trust your judgement
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3 comments:
Thank you for stopping by my little blog.
I find this difficult to get my head around. It is counter intuitive to think that “jumping to conclusions”, bypassing the usual empirical ways of coming to a judgement (assessing a situation and drawing a conclusion) is a wise move. Think of first impressions – very strongly felt, but as often wrong as right. Just because you feel something to be right doesn’t make it so. We all use Occam’s razor to cut to the chase, but there are dangers in this speed reading of experiences. It is said that 30% of any text is just cotton wool – but that doesn’t mean you can only read two out of three words. You never know which are the crucial bits until you’ve read it all. I hope not too many doctors, judges or bridge builders are persuaded of the gut-reaction concept. Call me on old empiricist, but I prefer to read the small print before I sign – the devil is usually in the detail.
Not sure I agree with Harry entirely, because there may well be an evolutionary explanation for good instinctive judgement. Selecting food, choosing shelter and assessing people: we've been doing these for many thousands of years, and it's entirely plausible that we've adapted survival mechanisms that are hard-wired into us as instinct.
Where instinct often fails - we're all notoriously bad at comparing risks and dealing with complexity - is where we face much newer problems, problems for which we're maladapted. The doctors, judges and builders Harry talks about are all dealing with modern problems for which instinct is not enough. (And many larger modern problems have a lower tolerance for error, making instinct insufficient).
Well, that's my gut reaction, anyway...
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