Deciding!

November 9th, 2024| Topic: RaMbLeS | 4

Decision making? It might all be a mirage, they say—researchers from Johns Hopkins University and The Ohio State University, in “The Illusion of Information Adequacy,” published in the Public Library of Science: ONE, the other day.

Information is required, of course, to come to a decision—any decision. But how much information does one need? Apparently, there is a psychological reason why some people aren’t just wrong in an argument— no, they’re confidently wrong!—and that is because they think, wrongly, that they have all the information they need.

Angus Fletcher, a professor of English at Ohio State University, who co-wrote the study:

Our brains are overconfident that they can arrive at a reasonable conclusion with very little information. People leap to judgments very quickly.”

The authors recruited nearly 1,300 people with an average age of about 40. Everyone read a fictitious story about a school that was running out of water because its local aquifer was drying up. But about 500 people read a version of the story that was in favor of the school merging with another school, presenting three arguments supporting the move and one neutral point. Another 500 people read a story with three arguments in favor of staying separate, plus the same neutral point. The last 300 people, the control group, read a balanced story that included all seven arguments—three pro-merge, three pro-separate, and one neutral.

After reading, the researchers asked participants about their opinions on what the school should do and how confident they were that they had all the information they needed to make that judgment.

The surveys revealed a majority was much more likely to agree with the argument that they had read —favoring the merger or favoring separation. And these folks who had read only one point of view were more likely to say they were more confident in their opinion than those in the control group who had read both arguments.

Then half of the participants in each group were then asked to read the opposing side’s information, which contradicted what they had read earlier. Although people were confident about their opinions when they had only read one-sided arguments, when presented with both sides, they were often willing to change their mind. They also reported that they were then less confident in their ability to form an opinion on the topic.

Fletcher again:

We thought that people would really stick to their original judgments even when they received information that contradicted those judgments, but it turns out if they learned something that seemed plausible to them, they were willing to totally change their minds.”

Which, I suppose, is a good thing. But the bottom line is this, according to Todd Rogers, a behavioral scientist at the Harvard Kennedy School of Government:

There seems to be a cognitive tendency to not realize the information we have is inadequate.”

Hence the title of the paper: “The Illusion of Information Adequacy.” Hey, even seven arguments may not be enough to come to a decision.

So my bottom line:

We know nothin’.”

But one thing we do need to know …

Shout triumphantly to Yahweh, all the earth.
Serve Yahweh with rejoicing;
come before Him with shouts of joy.
Know that Yahweh—He [is] God;
He—He made us, and His we [are]:
His people and the flock of His pasture.
Come into His gates with thanksgiving,
[and into] His with praise;
give thanks to Him, bless His name.
For good [is] Yahweh;
forever is His lovingkindness,
and unto generation after generation, His faithfulness.
Psalm 100:1–5

SOURCES: NBC; PLoS ONE