Qnas with Daniel Kahneman

Total Page:16

File Type:pdf, Size:1020Kb

Qnas with Daniel Kahneman QNAS QNAS QnAs with Daniel Kahneman Prashant Nair Science Writer The science of human decision-making has monitored. This, for example, is how people long been a stronghold of psychologists. almost always manage to refrain from swear- Among the voices that abound in the litera- ing in polite company. However, the self- ture on how people make choices, one monitoring is fairly lax, and most of the time scholarly voice has remained strident through the suggestions that arise automatically from several decades. By studying human behavior system 1 are simply endorsed by system 2 and through the lens of economics, Princeton expressed in behavior. As a result, impressions University psychologist Daniel Kahneman turn into beliefs, and impulses into choices. has shown how inherent biases might in- However, if you wanted to monitor yourself Daniel Kahneman. fluence our choices, overtly and subliminally. closely all of the time, it would quickly become For his influential work on prospect theory, impossible because system 2 is much slower which holds that people make decisions based and less efficient than system 1. So the idea of Neglect of duration would make sense from on their perceptions of losses and gains rather replacing system 1 with system 2 is infeasible. an evolutionary perspective: after a threaten- than on final outcomes, Kahneman shared the PNAS: You write that system 2, the part of ing episode, it is important for an organism 2002 Nobel Memorial Prize in economics. the mind that helps us make considered deci- to remember how bad the threat was and Working together with late psychologist sions, tends to be less active in monitoring how the episode ended; how long the episode Amos Tversky, a longtime research partner, system 1 when a person is happy. What are lasted is essentially irrelevant. Kahneman demonstrated that decisions be- the implications of that finding? PNAS: The book also touches upon the im- lieved to be the result of deliberation often Kahneman: The finding that mood has sub- portance of familiarity to the acceptance of stem from educated guesses, rules-of-thumb, tle but pervasive effects on people’s thoughts a message or conclusion. To wit, you describe and pattern-recognition. In his book Thinking has emerged in the last 15 years or so. Gener- the mere-exposure effect. Can you explain the Fast and Slow, a critical success published ally, people become less vigilant when they are effect and its implications for communicating in 2011 and targeting a broad audience, in a good mood, when system 1 impulses are scientific messages to a lay audience? Kahneman: Kahneman reports on a wealth of experi- morelikelytoexpressthemselvesasbeliefsor The mere-exposure effect holds mental research that point to two modes of choices. It turns out that there is a close asso- that when we are repeatedly exposed to some- decision-making in the human mind: Whereas ciation between vigilance and the degree to thing, we tend to trust or like it more. The fi system 1 is automatic, effortless, and rapid, which system 2 supervises system 1. What’s evolutionary justi cation for the effect, as more, the relationship is reciprocal: when the proposed by the late Robert Zajonc, is that rushing to judgment based on heuristics, ’ fluency of associative processing is low, it tends if you ve been in prolonged contact with some- system 2 is deliberate, effortful, and slow, ’ plodding through reason before reaching to result in bad mood, which, in turn, affects thing and it hasn tkilledyou,thenitmust conclusions. Understanding how we toggle associative processing. So people are more be relatively safe. The increasing sense of between the two systems, Kahneman says, can likely to make more superficial mistakes when safety with the familiar is thus an important help us make sense of a broad swath of human they are in a good mood; it’s not an enormous aspect of our everyday lives. However, sci- entificmessagesdon’t always lend themselves behavior. On the occasion of the 2012 Sackler effect but a fairly consistent one. ’ colloquium The Science of Science Communi- PNAS: You also distinguish between two to easy repetition, so I m not convinced of the value of repeating slogans to get scien- cation, where he was the keynote speaker, kinds of well-being: experienced and remem- fi Kahneman discussed his work with PNAS. bered. You note that memories of an experi- ti c ideas across to a wide audience. PNAS:Whatmotivatedyoutowriteapop- ence are influenced by its intensity and ending, On the other hand, science communicators ular book for a general audience? not by its duration. And to support the asser- should realize that if the message is intended to Kahneman: ’ ’ lead to action, they are effectively addressing I ve had a long career and tion, you cite experiments with people srecol- ’ worked in many fields. This book, which lection of unpleasantness during colonoscopies people s system 1, which thrives on stories, in- dividual anecdotes rather than statistics or ev- is not an autobiographical account, is a review administered under different conditions. ’ of many of those fields. I wanted to write a book Can you elaborate on your findings? idence. And most people s beliefs are shaped that would speak not only to the public but also Kahneman: Associative memory, or system not by arguments but by the beliefs of others to future scholars. Articles may become dated 1, works by producing chunks of narrative. they trust. Counterintuitive as it may seem to or less easily accessible, but a scholarly book that Certain aspects of the narrative, such as causal scientists, most people believe in conclusions before they accept arguments. So stories and appeals to a wide audience might endure. relations, tend to be emphasized. However, the source credibility are at least as important as PNAS: In the book you describe two duration of an experience is generally not the quality of arguments when it comes to the fictitious systems in our mind—systems 1 very important in assessing its overall value. public acceptance of scientificideas. and 2—that underlie our automatic and con- This is similar to narratives where events are sidered decisions, respectively. Would an critical and the uneventful passage of time is acuteawarenessoftheexistenceofthese ignored. We are aware of how long experi- This QnAs arises from the 12th Annual Sackler Lecture held May two systems allow people to suppress system ences last, and we certainly know that it’s 21, 2012 at the National Academy of Sciences in Washington, DC in conjunction with the Sackler Colloquium on The Science 1 while making decisions? better for good experiences to last longer Kahneman: of Science Communication. The Colloquium papers begin on Mostofthetimewefollow and bad experiences to be brief. However, page 14031 of the Supplement to this Issue. The video of the system 1; our impulses are generated au- our spontaneous evaluation of past experi- lecture can be viewed at https://www.youtube.com/watch?v= tomatically, but they are also continuously ences is generally quite insensitive to duration. di6kl4ViWgk&list=TLgKpPUi_8_x8. www.pnas.org/cgi/doi/10.1073/pnas.1314455110 PNAS Early Edition | 1of1 Downloaded by guest on September 29, 2021.
Recommended publications
  • All in the Mind Psychology for the Curious
    All in the Mind Psychology for the Curious Third Edition Adrian Furnham and Dimitrios Tsivrikos www.ebook3000.com This third edition first published 2017 © 2017 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd Edition history: Whurr Publishers Ltd (1e, 1996); Whurr Publishers Ltd (2e, 2001) Registered Office John Wiley & Sons, Ltd, The Atrium, Southern Gate, Chichester, West Sussex, PO19 8SQ, UK Editorial Offices 350 Main Street, Malden, MA 02148‐5020, USA 9600 Garsington Road, Oxford, OX4 2DQ, UK The Atrium, Southern Gate, Chichester, West Sussex, PO19 8SQ, UK For details of our global editorial offices, for customer services, and for information about how to apply for permission to reuse the copyright material in this book please see our website at www.wiley.com/wiley‐blackwell. The right of Adrian Furnham and Dimitrios Tsivrikos to be identified as the authors of this work has been asserted in accordance with the UK Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988. All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording or otherwise, except as permitted by the UK Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988, without the prior permission of the publisher. Wiley also publishes its books in a variety of electronic formats. Some content that appears in print may not be available in electronic books. Designations used by companies to distinguish their products are often claimed as trademarks. All brand names and product names used in this book are trade names, service marks, trademarks or registered trademarks of their respective owners.
    [Show full text]
  • A Unified Framework of the Shared Aesthetic Experience" (2016)
    Claremont Colleges Scholarship @ Claremont CMC Senior Theses CMC Student Scholarship 2016 A Unified rF amework of the Shared Aesthetic Experience Huakai Liao Claremont McKenna College Recommended Citation Liao, Huakai, "A Unified Framework of the Shared Aesthetic Experience" (2016). CMC Senior Theses. Paper 1307. http://scholarship.claremont.edu/cmc_theses/1307 This Open Access Senior Thesis is brought to you by Scholarship@Claremont. It has been accepted for inclusion in this collection by an authorized administrator. For more information, please contact [email protected]. Claremont McKenna College A Unified Framework of the Shared Aesthetic Experience submitted to Piercarlo Valdesolo and Dean Peter Uvin by Huakai Liao for Senior Thesis Fall 2015 01/25/2016 0 Acknowledgement First of all, I would like to express my sincere thanks to my thesis advisor, Dr. Valdesolo, for the continuous support throughout this project as well as my entire undergraduate career. There have been very difficult times during the span of this project. I could not thank him enough for his support and understanding during those times. I still remembered the first day of freshman year when I asked him to join his laboratory to study emotion and he said yes. The interest in emotion has grown since then and led me to my other thesis in computer science on the topic of building emotional machine as well as the current project. I would also like to thank Dr. Halpern for her support. Even after her retirement, her door has always been open whenever I ran into trouble. She supported and cared for me during some of my difficult times.
    [Show full text]
  • Unit 4: Study Guide Motivation and Emotion
    Unit 4: Study Guide Motivation and Emotion In studying motivation, students learn about the forces that influence the strength and direction of behavior including homeostasis. They discover that although early theories of motivation focused on internal instincts, needs, and drives, later theories acknowledged the role of external incentives. The concepts of intrinsic and extrinsic motivation are also examined. Students also learn that more recent theories conceptualize motives into at least two distinct types: primary (physiological) and secondary (social). In the case of the primary motives – such as hunger, thirst, pain, and sex – psychologists have identified many of the neural and hormonal mechanisms that are associated with the motivational state. The motives for sex and aggression appear to be more complex than those for hunger and thirst, involving both physiological and environmental mechanisms; however, even hunger appears to be influenced by environmental stimuli, particularly in the case of people who are obese. The study of emotion centers on the complex interactions between cognition and physiological mechanisms that are associated with feelings of love, hate, fear, and jealousy. Different theories – such as James-Lange, Cannon-Bard, Schachter-Singer, and opponent- process theory - provide different explanations of the relationship between physiological changes and emotional experiences. Central to much current theory and research is the concept of arousal; that is, the activation of several physiological systems at the same time, suggesting a relationship between task performance and level of arousal. CR8: The course provides instruction in motivation and emotion Text: Chapter 12 (pp. 469 – 510) Chapter 13 (pp. 513 – 544) Student Resources: Flashcards from text www.worthpublishers.com/myers8e I can see it all over your face, Forty Studies, pp.
    [Show full text]
  • Bob Zajonc and the Unconscious Emotion ISSN 1754-0739 DOI: 10.1177/1754073910375480 Er.Sagepub.Com
    Emotion Review Vol. 2, No. 4 (October 2010) 353–362 © 2010 SAGE Publications and The International Society for Research on Emotion Bob Zajonc and the Unconscious Emotion ISSN 1754-0739 DOI: 10.1177/1754073910375480 er.sagepub.com Piotr Winkielman Department of Psychology, University of California, San Diego, USA and Warsaw School of Social Psychology, Poland Abstract This article focuses on Bob Zajonc’s views on unconscious emotion, especially in the context of the debates about the independ- ence of affect and cognition. Historically, Bob was always interested in the “mere”—basic, fundamental processes. His empirical demonstrations of precognitive and preconscious emotional processes, combined with his elegant expositions of them, sharply contrasted with cold and complex cognitive models. Interestingly, Bob tended to believe that whereas the causes of emotion can be unconscious, the emotional state itself tends to be conscious. However, he reconsidered this assumption and in his later work showed that subjects in affective priming experiments do not experience conscious affect, but instead act on basic preferences. Today, Bob’s insights continue to inspire research on “unconscious emotion.” Keywords consciousness, emotion, Zajonc The relation between emotion and consciousness interested has not only redirected the field but continues to inspire new Bob Zajonc throughout much of his career. Although he never research and new researchers. wrote a comprehensive treatise on “unconscious emotion,” he often thought and wrote about it. Most directly, Bob addressed The Background of the Idea this issue in a short essay published in the book The Nature of The Mere Emotion: Fundamental Questions edited by Paul Ekman and Richard Davison (1994).
    [Show full text]
  • Daniel Kahneman Curriculum Vitae August 2016
    Daniel Kahneman Curriculum Vitae August 2016 Born: 1934, Tel Aviv, Israel Citizenship: US, Israel Education Ph.D. University of California, Berkeley, 1961 (Psychology) B.A. The Hebrew University, Jerusalem, 1954, (Psychology and Mathematics) Professional Positions Held 2007- Professor of Psychology and Public Affairs, Emeritus, Woodrow Wilson School, Princeton University 2007- Eugene Higgins Professor of Psychology, Emeritus, Princeton University 2000- Fellow, Center for Rationality, Hebrew University, Jerusalem 1993-2007 Eugene Higgins Professor of Psychology, Princeton University 1993-2007 Professor of Psychology and Public Affairs, Woodrow Wilson School, Princeton University 1991-1992 Visiting Scholar, Russell Sage Foundation 1986-1994 Professor of Psychology, University of California, Berkeley 1984-1986 Associate Fellow, Canadian Institute for Advanced Research 1978-1986 Professor of Psychology, The University of British Columbia 1977-1978 Fellow, Center for Advanced Studies in the Behavioral Sciences 1968-1969 Visiting Scientist (summers), Applied Psychological Research Unit, Cambridge, England 1966-1967 Fellow, Center for Cognitive Studies; Lecturer in Psychology, Harvard University 1965-1966 Visiting Scientist, Department of Psychology, University of Michigan 1961-1978 Lecturer to Professor, The Hebrew University, Jerusalem, Israel LINKS TO RECENT LECTURES Video and Audio Links “Interview with Leif Nelson,” The Society for Judgment and Decision Making, November 2015. “Thinking That We Know”, Sackler Colloquium to the National Academy
    [Show full text]
  • JM Wanen, Pennsylvania State University D .. R. Williams
    ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS (Continued) J. M. Wanen, Pennsylvania State University D .. R. Williams, University of Pennsylvania Richard M Wanen, University of Wisconsin, Milwaukee R. Wilton, University of Texas Daniel J. Weintraub, University of Michigan P. Wong, York University B. Weiss, University of Rochester Medical Center Antony Wright, University of Texas E. L. Wike, University of Kansss Robert Zajonc, University of Michigan Michael D. Zeiler, Emory University NOTES &; NEWS Ricardo Dobson, who, for the past Department of Psychology. !,:ormerly Education at Cornell University on three years, was Assistant Professor at he was a lecturer in the Department of September 1. Mary Washington College of the Social Relations, Harvard University. University of Virginia, is now Richard F. Nash who has just Associate Senior Research Willem J. M. Levelt, who spent the received his PhD in psychology from Psychologist at General Motors last academic year at the Institute for Tulane University, has accepted a Research Laboratories in Warren, Advanced Study, Princeton, is now position as Assistant Professor in the Michigan. back at his permanent position as Psychology Deparfm'ent at Marquette Professor of Psychology, Nijmegen University. His major area of interest is R. B. Freeman, Jr., formerly Uniuersity, The Netherlands. animal behavior. Professor at The Pennsylvania State University, is now Professor of Gardner Lindzey, who has been at Larry M. Raskin is returning to Psychology at the University of The University of Texas in Austin for Purdue University as Associate Konstanz, Germany. He will be the past few years, and most recently Professor in the Department of Child teaching in the fields of experimental at the Center for Advanced Studies in Development and Family Life after a and physiological psychology and the Behavioral Sciences at Stanford, year's leave of absence at the Division continuing research.
    [Show full text]
  • 511795 Chicago LR 73#3.Ps
    Judges as Rulemakers Emily Sherwin† In Do Cases Make Bad Law?, Frederick Schauer raises some se- rious questions about the process of judicial lawmaking.1 Schauer takes issue with the widely held assumption that judge-made law benefits from the court’s focus on a particular real-world dispute.2 Writing with characteristic eloquence, Schauer argues that the need to resolve a concrete dispute does not enhance the ability of judges to craft sound rules, but instead generates cognitive biases that distort judicial development of legal rules. Schauer’s observations about the risks of rulemaking in an adju- dicatory setting are very persuasive. Yet his overall assessment of the common law process may be too severe. In this Essay, I shall suggest that common law decisionmaking, at least in its more traditional forms, has features that can counteract the biases that worry Schauer and provide at least some protection from the errors his theory pre- dicts. Specifically, the common judicial practices of consulting prece- dent decisions and seeking analogies in the facts of prior cases broaden the perspective of judges and allow them to better assess the consequences of proposed rules. This is so even if following precedent and reasoning by analogy are not otherwise defensible. I. SCHAUER’S CASE AGAINST COMMON LAW RULEMAKING Schauer begins with the premise that judges do in fact make law.3 Prior to the twentieth century, jurists often characterized their task as discovery of rules embedded in legal tradition and common practice.4 †Professor of Law, Cornell Law School. 1 See generally Frederick Schauer, Do Cases Make Bad Law?, 73 U Chi L Rev 883 (2006).
    [Show full text]
  • Direct Tests of Cumulative Prospect Theory⇤
    Direct Tests of Cumulative Prospect Theory⇤ B. Douglas Bernheim † Charles Sprenger‡ Stanford University and NBER UC San Diego First Draft: December 1, 2014 This Version: November 8, 2016 Abstract Cumulative Prospect Theory (CPT), the leading behavioral account of decision making under uncertainty, assumes that the probability weight applied to a given outcome depends on its ranking. This assumption is needed to avoid the violations of dominance implied by Prospect Theory (PT). We devise a simple test involving three-outcome lotteries, based on the implication that compensating adjustments to the payo↵s in two states should depend on their rankings compared with payo↵s in a third state. In an experiment, we are unable to find any support for the assumption of rank dependence. We separately elicit probability weighting functions for the same subjects through conventional techniques involving binary lotteries. These functions imply that changes in payo↵rank should change the compensating adjustments in our three-outcome lotteries by 20-40%, yet we can rule out any change larger than 7% at standard confidence levels. Additional tests nevertheless indicate that the dominance patterns predicted by PT do not arise. We reconcile these findings by positing a form of complexity aversion that generalizes the well-known certainty e↵ect. JEL classification: D81, D90 Keywords:ProspectTheory,CumulativeProspectTheory,RankDependence,CertaintyEquiv- alents. ⇤We are grateful to Ted O’Donoghue, Colin Camerer, Nick Barberis, Kota Saito, and seminar participants at Cornell, Caltech, and Gary’s Conference (UC Santa Barbara) for helpful and thoughtful discussions. Fulya Ersoy, Vincent Leah-Martin, Seung-Keun Martinez, and Alex Kellogg all provided valuable research assistance.
    [Show full text]
  • Relation Exchange As the Model of Bounded Rationality
    Relation exchange as the model of bounded rationality June 16, 2017 Sung Sup Rhee Emeritus professor at Soongsil University [email protected] This paper is a preliminary version which is prepared for the presentation at 2017 KEA- APEA conference, July 7-8, 2017. Title: Relation exchange as the model of bounded rationality Author: Sung Sup Rhee/Emeritus professor at Soongsil University/[email protected] Abstracts: Kahneman (2003) presented the scheme of human cognitive system, which presents the steps of sensory order. Human cognition begins with perceptions, from which intuition comes off as fast, parallel, automatic, effortless and emotional system. Reasoning is slow, serial, controlled, effortful and rule-governed system of cognition. The architecture of rational agent model is built on the unrealistic assumption of single cognitive system which has the logical ability of a flawless system of reasoning. However, upon encountering the need to make decision, individuals are likely to act intuitively because intuition is more accessible than reason, which is at odds with the premise of rational agent model and prompts the launching of empiricism approach (Hume 1739). The process of sympathy and consent may be considered as the conduit between different cognitive systems of different individuals. Then, the relational interactions among individuals, i.e. relation exchange should be conceived as the outcome of sympathy-consent process (Rhee 2012b, 2016b). The fundamentality of relation exchange in comparison with value exchange vindicates the legitimacy of relation exchange as the model of bounded rationality. Keywords Cognitive system, accessibility, sympathy-consent process, relation exchange, open/indeterminate system, bounded rationality JEL code: D01, D03 I.
    [Show full text]
  • Doing the Right Thing: Business Ethics, Moral Indeterminancy & Existentialism
    DOING THE RIGHT THING: BUSINESS ETHICS, MORAL INDETERMINANCY & EXISTENTIALISM Charles Sherwood London School of Economics Tutor: Susanne Burri Winner: Postgraduate Category Institute of Business Ethics Student Essay Competition 2017 Introduction Business ethics is a subject of growing interest to academics and practitioners alike. But can moral theory really guide business decision-making? And, can it do so when it matters? i.e. when those decisions get difficult. Difficult managerial decisions have many characteristics. They are important, often hurried, sometimes contentious. But, perhaps above all, they are ambiguous. We are unsure what is the right choice. Imagine the following… Arlette, an executive in a foreign-aid charity, needs to get vital supplies across a frontier to refugee families with children nearing starvation. Her agent on the ground is asked by border guards for a $5,000 bribe, some of which they will pocket personally and the rest of which will help fund a terror campaign. False, dishonest and illegal accounting will be required to disguise the use of the funds from donors and regulators. Arlette is coming up for promotion. She tries to explain the problem to her superior. He is impatient and just tells her to get the job done. Should Arlette allow the agent to pay the bribe? Moral theories struggle to resolve this kind of ambiguity, because they prove indeterminate in one of two ways: either they advocate a single, ‘monolithic’ principle that is all but impossible to apply in complex situations like the above; or they offer an array of principles that individually are more easily applied, yet conflict with each other.
    [Show full text]
  • The History of Transaction Cost Economics and Its Recent Developments
    Munich Personal RePEc Archive The history of transaction cost economics and its recent developments Lukasz, Hardt University of Warsaw, Faculty of Economic Sciences, Polish Academy of Sciences, Inistitute of Economic Sciences 2009 Online at https://mpra.ub.uni-muenchen.de/17989/ MPRA Paper No. 17989, posted 20 Oct 2009 19:28 UTC Erasmus Journal for Philosophy and Economics, Volume 2, Issue 1, Summer 2009, pp. 29-51. h p://ejpe.org/pdf/2-1-ar -2.pdf The history of transaction cost economics and its recent developments -K, . H,R0T Universi y of Warsaw Polish Academy of Sciences Abstract: The emergence of transaction cost economics (T1E) in the early 1970s with 3liver 4illiamson5s successful reconciliation of the so- called neoclassical approach with Herbert imon5s organi7ational theory can be considered an important part of the first cognitive turn in economics. The development of T1E until the late 1980s was particularly marked by treating the firm as an avoider of negative frictions, i.e., of transaction costs. However, since the 1990s T1E has been enriched by various approaches stressing the role of the firm in creating positive value, e.g., the literature on modularity. Hence, a second cognitive turn has taken place: the firm is no longer only seen as an avoider of negative costs but also as a creator of positive knowledge. Key ords: transaction cost economics, 3liver 4illiamson, theory of the firm, modularity literature, cognitive turn JEL Classification: B21, B31, 021, 023, 083 Transaction cost economics (T1E) has a long past since what we generally speak of as <transaction costs5 have been present in economic discourse for centuries.
    [Show full text]
  • Behavioral Economics in Context Applications for Development, Inequality & Discrimination, Finance, and Environment
    Behavioral Economics In Context Applications for Development, Inequality & Discrimination, Finance, and Environment By Anastasia C. Wilson An ECI Teaching Module on Social and Environmental Issues in Economics Global Development Policy Center Boston University 53 Bay State Road Boston, MA 02155 bu.edu/gdp Economics in Context Initiative, Global Development Policy Center, Boston University, 2020. Permission is hereby granted for instructors to copy this module for instructional purposes. Suggested citation: Wilson, Anastasia C. (2020) “Behavioral Economics In Context: Applications for Development, Inequality & Discrimination, Finance, and Environment.” An ECI Teaching Module on Social and Economic Issues, Economics in Context Initiative, Global Development Policy Center, Boston University, 2020. Students may also download the module directly from: http://www.bu.edu/eci/education-materials/teaching-modules/ Comments and feedback from course use are welcomed: Economics in Context Initiative Global Development Policy Center Boston University 53 Bay State Road Boston, MA 02215 http://www.bu.edu/eci/ Email: [email protected] NOTE – terms denoted in bold face are defined in the KEY TERMS AND CONCEPTS section at the end of the module. BEHAVIORAL ECONOMICS IN CONTEXT TABLE OF CONTENTS 1. INTRODUCTION ........................................................................................................ 4 1.1 The History and Development of Behavioral Economics .......................................................... 5 1.2 Behavioral Economics Toolkit:
    [Show full text]