Learning Target: I will be able to describe obstacles in forming judgements and decision making

Effortless, immediate, automatic feeling or thought, rather than conscious reasoning

Think about the last project you had to do…how long did you think it would take you? Did it take longer than that?

Stereotypes are maintained by this error; people often disregard examples contradicting stereotypes by treating the new information as merely an exception, and not a challenge to the rule.

The way an issue is posed; how an issue is framed can significantly affect decisions and judgements

Availability Heuristic Estimating the likelihood of events based on their availability in our memory. Do we have more deaths due to car accidents or sickness? The Bronx, NY Which place would you be more scared of getting mugged or even murdered? Although diseases kill many more people than accidents, it has been shown that people will judge accidents and diseases to be equally fatal. This is because accidents are more dramatic and are often written up in the paper or seen on the news on t.v., and are more available in memory than diseases. Gary, Indiana The crime rate of Gary, Indiana is MUCH higher than the Bronx. But when you think of crime, which town comes to mind?

HEURISTICS Types of Heuristics If you were to spend next month in the Middle East, should you fear (A) being the victim of a terrorist attack, or (B) being in an automobile accident?

HEURISTICS Types of Heuristics Statistically, it is far more probable to be in a car accident in the Middle East than in a terrorist attack. An availability heuristic is when you estimate the likelihood of events based on their availability in memory (how readily they come to mind).

Representativeness Heuristic  “judge a book by its cover.” Who went to Harvard? Judging a situation based on how similar the aspects are to the prototypes the person holds in their mind. Sonia Dara is a Sports Illustrated swimsuit model, you would make certain quick judgments (heuristics) about her…like about her interests or intelligence. She was an economics major at Harvard University.

How is racial profiling a representative heuristic? For example, if an officer believes that all people in a category (e.g., a minority group) have a tendency to make a living by criminal behavior, then their decision making about a target person is based on how the person’s characteristics is similar to those of the group.

Representative or Availability? Airline reservations typically decline after a highly publicized airplane crash because people overestimate the incidence of such disasters. In such instances, people’s decisions are being influenced by

Representative or Availability? Having been told that Terry is an engineer and Alex is an elementary school teacher, when Arnold meets the couple for the first time, he assumes that Terry is the husband and Alex is the wife, rather than the opposite, which is the case.