judgement and reasoning chapter 12 Flashcards
What is attribute substitution?
commuting routes one way or the other;? strategy in which you rely on easily assessed information as a proxy for the information you really need. In the judgement about traffic the information you need is frequency (how often you’ve been late when you’ve taken one route or the other), but don’t have access to the information. As a substitute you base your judgement on availability-how easily and quick you can come up with relevant examples.
Frequency and Availability are key
Describe the availability heuristic and give an example
the stratergy of relying on frequency and avalibility is a form of attribution substitution know as availability heuristic.
The logic of this: “examples leap to mind? must be common, often-experienced event. A struggle to think of examples? must be rare event.”
Heuristic- describes an efficient strategy that usually leads to the right answer. key being usually.
but can go wrong, when people are asked are there more words starting with r or r as the third letter. people will say starting with r because it is more avalible.
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Describe the representativeness heuristic and give the gambler’s fallacy example
relies on resemblance, eg if a person is interviewing you, what you really want is for them to look at your credentials and judge your previous work. however they are more likely to judge of resemblance (do they look/act like other good workers or are they like one i just had to fire) this is the Representativeness heuristic
the gambler`s fallacy: eg if you toss a coin over and over again and it lands on heads 6 times people then start to think well if the coin is fair then there should be roughly equal numbers of heads and tails. However, the coin has no memory and does not know when the last tails was, it is always just a 50/50 chance. the explination lies in the assumption of the catagory homogeneity ( thing are same or same kind)
How and why do people reason from a single case to the entire population?
the “man who” or “woman who” arguments. the assumption of homogeneity (everything being the same or fit in a category).
“ what do you mean you bought that phone, my friend bought one and it broke the next day” even though all the phone over whole population was goo rating they generalize.
“what you mean cigarettes’ cause cancer my aunt runs marathons and smoked all her life”
Why is covariation important?
covary is when two things relate with one comes the other, eg. exercise increases stamina but there is no stamina without exercise. It is important for checking ab belief about cause and effect. eg does having breakfast in the morning make you feel better? the presents or absence of breakfast should determine how you will feel the rest of the day.
What are illusions of covariation?
people routinely detect covariation even where there is none. eg people think there start sign relates to their personality, but no data has found that to be true.
Why do illusions of covariation occur?
in making these judgements people only consider the a subset of the facts and its skewed by their prior expectations, bias input leads to bias output.
Likely guided by conformation bias; a tendency to be more alert to evidence that confirms your beliefs rather then to evidence that might challenge them.
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How do we know that people sometimes ignore base rate information?
-information about how frequently something occurs in general. eg if they are testing a new drug to treat a cold and it is found that 70% recover in 48 hours. however their need to be a base rate, how many people recovery without any drugs in 48 hours, if it is also 70% then the new drug has no effect.
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- Describe Type 1 and Type 2 thinking
type 1 is the fast and easy; the heuristics we’ve described fall into this category. The other type is slower and more effortful, but also more accurate.
- When are people more likely to use Type 2 thinking?
when things really matter is one hypothesis, but it is more likely to occur only if is is triggered by certain cues and only if the circumstances are correct, it also requires more effort and therefore if, so if likely to occur if the person can pay attention on the judgement being made.
Describe how the presentation of the problem, chance, and education can affect people’s judgments
fast but accurate judgements are also more likely if the role of random chance is conspicuous in a problem, if this is a prominent role, people are more likely to realize that the evidence they’re considering may just be a fluke or an accident not an indication of a reliable pattern. With this people are more likely to pat attention to the quality of evidence, on the (sensible) idea that a larger set of observations is less vulnerable to chance fluctuations. (the restaurant example 468)
the quality of a persons thinking is also shaped by the background knowledge that she or he brings to a judgement. statistics phone example 469.
What are the differences between inductive and deductive reasoning?
Inductive reasoning; the process through which you make forecasts about new cases, based on cases you have observed so far.
Deductive reasoning: a process in which you start with claims or assertions that you count as “given” and ask what follows from these premises. eg you might already make the assumption that red wine gives you head aches, what follows from this ? Deduction has many functions, including keeping ones beliefs in touch with reality. if deduction leads you to a prediction based on you beliefs and the prediction turns out to be wrong, this indicates that something is off track in you beliefs, so that claims you thought were solidly established arnt so solid after all.
Describe confirmation bias and give an example
conformation bias; a greater sensitivity to confirming evidence and a tendency to neglect disconfirming evidence. People want to protect their beliefs from challenge.
in a study people were wanting to confirm the rules they had made and requests to disconfirm were rarely made. people who were seeking to disconfirm their rule were actually more likely to find the rule.
Describe how people reinterpret disconfirming evidence
different manifestation of conformation bias. when people encounter information consistent with their beliefs they are likely to take the evidence at face value, accepting it without challenge or question. in contrast, when people encounter evidence that`s inconsistent with their beliefs they are often skeptical and scrutinize the new evidence, seeking flaws or ambiguities.
What is belief perseverance and how do we know that it exists?
even when disconfirming evidence is undeniable, people sometimes don`t use it, leading to a phenomenon called belief perseverance.
the example of suicide notes and feedback study. all participants preserved their beliefs even when the basis for the belief had been completely discredited.
they internalized the feedback and found other examples of times to confirm this belief. so even when the researcher discredited the information, you still have the information you provided yourself, and on this basis you might maintain your belief.
