Stickiness, the Locked Door, and Monkey See, Monkey Do

The Locked Door: The Secret Life of Snap Decisions Primed for Action & Scrambled Sentences: (1) aggressively, bold, rude, bother, disturb intrude, infringe (2) respect, considerate, appreciate, patiently, yield, polite, courteous Steel & Aronson’s “Stereotype Threat” Race identification and educational performance

The “Stickiness” Factor Sesame Street as an “educational virus” that triggered a learning epidemic The “stickiness” of a message is a measure of how memorable it is. e.g., Yale University tetanus shot experiment and the “clutter problem” e.g., UR’s 2005 “be careful when walking” after it snowed

“Stickiness” Factor & Sesame Street Kids don’t watch t.v. when they are stimulated and look away when they’re bored. They watch when they _________ and they look away when they’re __________. Sesame Street’s innovative blend of Muppets and adults grew out of a desperate desire to be sticky. each show’s “success” was based on eye-tracking research

“Stickiness” Blue’s Clues How are “Sesame Street” and “Blue’s Clues” different?

The Wisdom of Crowds: Independence “finding the party” on Friday and Saturday nights and the “herds” of UR students wandering around campus in something of a “circular mill” “herding” and NFL coaches’ 4 th down decisions “imitation” and “social proof” e.g., Milgram’s “staring into the empty sky” experiment crowd sizes and responses ( 1 person = tiny fraction of public) ( 5 persons = 4 times as many) (15 persons = 45% stopped and stared) (20 persons = 80% stopped and stared)

The Wisdom of Crowds: Independence “information cascades” (aggregate information like the Stock Market or casinos or voting systems) e.g., plank roads (8 vs. 4 years durability) e.g., telecoms and 1,000% annual growth good information cascades e.g., the humble screw Collective decisions are most likely to be good ones when they’re made by people with diverse opinions reaching independent, non-sequential conclusions, relying primarily on their own private information.

Malcolm Gladwell’s “Blink” and Thin Slicing Our brain uses two very different strategies to make sense of many situations and to process the extraordinary amount of data we are constantly processing: (1) conscious and (2) unconscious The latter operates entirely below the surface of consciousness. “Fast and Frugal”: you often know something and respond accordingly before you fully understand and can explain it

Speed-Dating, the Storytelling Problem, and Group Decision-Making Task: (1.) break into teams of 2 students (2.) come up with 1 question that you would want to ask everyone you met in a speed-dating scenario (3.) vote as a class (“crowd”) on the 4 favorite questions (4.) try to come up with reasons for your preferences- votes