Judgment Under Uncertainty: Heuristics and Biases
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Acceptable Risk: a Conceptual Proposal
RISK: Health, Safety & Environment (1990-2002) Volume 5 Number 1 Article 3 January 1994 Acceptable Risk: A Conceptual Proposal Baruch Fischhoff Follow this and additional works at: https://scholars.unh.edu/risk Part of the Risk Analysis Commons, Science and Technology Law Commons, and the Science and Technology Studies Commons Repository Citation Baruch Fischhoff, Acceptable Risk: A Conceptual Proposal , 5 RISK 1 (1994). This Article is brought to you for free and open access by the University of New Hampshire – Franklin Pierce School of Law at University of New Hampshire Scholars' Repository. It has been accepted for inclusion in RISK: Health, Safety & Environment (1990-2002) by an authorized editor of University of New Hampshire Scholars' Repository. For more information, please contact [email protected]. Acceptable Risk: A Conceptual Proposal* Baruch Fischhoff** Introduction The Search for Acceptability Perhaps the most widely sought quantity in the management of hazardous technologies is the acceptable level of risk.1 Technologies whose risks fall below that level could go about their business, without worrying further about the risks that they impose on others. Riskier technologies would face closure if they could not be brought into compliance. For designers and operators, having a well-defined acceptable level of risk would provide a clear target for managing their technology. For regulators, identifying an acceptable level of risk would mean resolving value issues at the time that standards are set, allowing an agency's technical staff to monitor compliance mechanically, without having to make case-specific political and ethical decisions. For * Support for this research was provided under National Science Foundation Grant SES-8715564. -
Fischhoff Vita 190914
BARUCH FISCHHOFF Howard Heinz University Professor Department of Engineering & Public Policy Institute for Politics and Strategy Carnegie Mellon University Pittsburgh, PA 15213-3890 [email protected] http://www.cmu.edu/epp/people/faculty/baruch-fischhoff.html Born: April 21, 1946, Detroit, Michigan Education 1967 B.Sc. (Mathematics, Psychology) magna cum laude, Wayne State University, 1967-1970 Kibbutz Gal-On and Kibbutz Lahav, Israel 1972 M.A. (Psychology) with distinction, The Hebrew University of Jerusalem 1975 Ph.D. (Psychology), The Hebrew University of Jerusalem Positions 1970-1974 Instructor, Department of Behavioral Sciences, University of the Negev 1971-1972 Research Assistant (to Daniel Kahneman), The Hebrew University of Jerusalem, Israel 1973-1974 Methodological Advisor and Instructor, Paul Baerwald School of Social Work, MSW Program in Social Work Research, The Hebrew University of Jerusalem 1974-1976 Research Associate, Oregon Research Institute, Eugene, Oregon 1975-1987 Visiting Assistant Professor, Dept. of Psychology, University of Oregon, 1975- 1980; Visiting Associate Professor, 1980-1987 1976-1987 Research Associate, Decision Research, a branch of Perceptronics, Eugene, Oregon 1981-1982 Visiting Scientist, Medical Research Council/Applied Psychology Unit, Cambridge, England 1982-1983 Visiting Scientist, Department of Psychology, University of Stockholm 1984-1990 Research Associate, Eugene Research Institute, Eugene, Oregon 1987- Howard Heinz University Professor of Engineering and Public Policy and of Social and Decision Sciences (until 2016) and of Strategy and Politics (since 2016), Carnegie Mellon University 2014- Visiting Professor, Leeds University School of Business Selected Awards and Honors 1964-1967 Wayne State University Undergraduate Scholarship 1966-1967 NSF Undergraduate Research Grant (under Samuel Komorita) 1967 Phi Beta Kappa 1969-1974 The Hebrew University of Jerusalem Graduate Fellowships 1980 American Psychological Association Distinguished Scientific Award for Early Career Contribution to Psychology 1985 Harold D. -
Baruch Fischhoff: the Importance of Testing Messages Why Governments Need to Test Their Messages on Novel Coronavirus Disease (COVID-19) Before Disseminating Them
News Baruch Fischhoff: the importance of testing messages Why governments need to test their messages on novel coronavirus disease (COVID-19) before disseminating them. Baruch Fischhoff talks to Fiona Fleck. Q: You started studying risk and human behaviour in the 1970s. What sparked Baruch Fischhoff is a psychologist and authority on that interest? the science of decision-making. His research addresses A: I majored in mathematics, with a judgment- and decision-making, with a particular focus secondary major in psychology and then on risk analysis, perception, and communication. He had the extraordinary good fortune to has authored or co-authored over 200 peer-reviewed study and work with pioneers in the field articles and co-authored or edited 11 books. He is the of decision-making, including Daniel Howard Heinz University Professor in the Department Kahneman, Amos Tversky, Paul Slovic, of Engineering and Public Policy and the Institute for and Sarah Lichtenstein. Eventually that Courtesy of Baruch Fischhoff led to the study of the psychology be- Baruch Fischhoff Politics and Strategy at Carnegie Mellon University, in hind judgments and preferences, risk the United States of America (USA). He is also a member analysis, and risk communication. My of the National Academy of Sciences and the National Academy of Medicine. professional entry into the field began He received a Bachelor of Science in mathematics and psychology from Wayne in the 1970s when my colleagues and I State University in 1967 and a master’s and doctorate in psychology from the were approached by technologists and Hebrew University of Jerusalem in 1972 and 1975. -
Trust, Emotion, Sex, Politics, and Science: Surveying the Risk Assessment Battlefield Paul Slovic [email protected]
University of Chicago Legal Forum Volume 1997 | Issue 1 Article 4 Trust, Emotion, Sex, Politics, and Science: Surveying the Risk Assessment Battlefield Paul Slovic [email protected] Follow this and additional works at: http://chicagounbound.uchicago.edu/uclf Recommended Citation Slovic, Paul () "Trust, Emotion, Sex, Politics, and Science: Surveying the Risk Assessment Battlefield," University of Chicago Legal Forum: Vol. 1997: Iss. 1, Article 4. Available at: http://chicagounbound.uchicago.edu/uclf/vol1997/iss1/4 This Article is brought to you for free and open access by Chicago Unbound. It has been accepted for inclusion in University of Chicago Legal Forum by an authorized administrator of Chicago Unbound. For more information, please contact [email protected]. Trust, Emotion, Sex, Politics, and Science: Surveying the Risk Assessment Battlefield Paul Slovict The practice of risk assessment has steadily increased in prominence during the past several decades, as risk managers in government and industry have sought to develop more effective ways to meet public demands for a safer and healthier environ- ment. Dozens of scientific disciplines have been mobilized to provide technical information about risk, and billions of dollars have been expended to create this information and distill it in the context of risk assessments.1 Ironically, as our society and other industrialized nations have expended this great effort to make life safer and healthier, many in the public have become more, rather than less, con- cerned about risk. These individuals see themselves as exposed to more serious risks than were faced by people in the past, and they believe that this situation is getting worse rather than better.2 Nuclear and chemical technologies (except for medicines) have been stigmatized by being perceived as entailing unnatural- ly great risks.3 As a result, it has been difficult, if not impossi- t President of Decision Research in Eugene, Oregon, and Professor of Psychology at the University of Oregon. -
Association for Consumer Research
ASSOCIATION FOR CONSUMER RESEARCH Association for Consumer Research, University of Minnesota Duluth, 115 Chester Park, 31 West College Street Duluth, MN 55812 Emotion, Scientific Reasoning, and Judgments of Scientific Evidence Caitlin Drummond, University of Michigan, USA Baruch Fischhoff, Carnegie Mellon University, USA We examine how consumers’ ability to reason about and emotional reactions to scientific evidence relate to their judgments of it. In an online study, reasoning ability and emotional reactions to controversial research separately predicted understanding of it, judgments of its quality, and trust in the scientists who conducted it. [to cite]: Caitlin Drummond and Baruch Fischhoff (2018) ,"Emotion, Scientific Reasoning, and Judgments of Scientific Evidence", in NA - Advances in Consumer Research Volume 46, eds. Andrew Gershoff, Robert Kozinets, and Tiffany White, Duluth, MN : Association for Consumer Research, Pages: 115-120. [url]: http://www.acrwebsite.org/volumes/2412349/volumes/v46/NA-46 [copyright notice]: This work is copyrighted by The Association for Consumer Research. For permission to copy or use this work in whole or in part, please contact the Copyright Clearance Center at http://www.copyright.com/. Consuming Science: Knowledge, Acceptance, and Judgements of Scientific Information and Technology Chairs: Nicholas Light, University of Colorado Boulder, USA Philip Fernbach, University of Colorado Boulder, USA Paper #1: A Taxonomy of Opposition to Genetically Modified naturalness, or acceptability in Christian doctrine. These findings Foods suggest that attitudes are based on the moralization of GM foods. Philip Fernbach, University of Colorado Boulder, USA In the third paper, the authors examine how consumers’ ability Nicholas Light, University of Colorado Boulder, USA to reason about—and emotional reactions to—scientific evidence re- late to their judgments. -
About the Editors and Contributors
About the Editors and Contributors Harold A. Trinkunas Harold A. Trinkunas is the deputy director of, and a senior research scholar at, the Center for International Security and Cooperation at the Freeman Spogli Institute for International Studies at Stanford University. His research focuses on issues related to foreign policy, governance, and security, particularly in Latin America. Trinkunas has coauthored Militants, Criminals, and Warlords: The Challenge of Local Governance in an Age of Disorder (Brookings Institution Press, 2017) and Aspirational Power: Brazil on the Long Road to Global Infl uence (Brookings Institution Press, 2016). He authored Crafting Civilian Control of the Military in Venezuela (University of North Carolina Press, 2005). He coedited and contributed to American Crossings: Border Politics in the Western Hemisphere ( Johns Hopkins University Press, 2015), Ungoverned Spaces: Alternatives to State Authority in an Era of Softened Sovereignty (Stanford University Press, 2010), Global Politics of Defense Reform (Palgrave MacMillan, 2008), and Terrorism Financing and State Responses (Stanford University Press, 2007). He received his doctorate in political science from Stanford University in 1999. Herbert S. Lin Herb Lin is a senior research scholar for cyberpolicy and security at the Center for International Security and Cooperation and the Hank J. Holland Fellow in Cyber Policy and Security at the Hoover Institution at Stanford University. His research interests focus on cybersecurity and cyberspace. Lin is particu- larly -
Communicating Risks and Benefits: an Evidence-Based User's Guide
Acknowledgements We offer special thanks to Nancy Ostrove, recently retired from her position as Director, Risk Communication Staff, Office of Planning of the US Food and Drug Administration (FDA), and Lee Zwanziger, Designated Federal Official for FDA’s Risk Communication Advisory Committee. Without them, this guide, like so many of FDA’s initiatives, would not have happened. We also thank Nancy Derr and Elena Ketelhut for their thoughtful and patient help in seeing the guide through the production process. Finally, we thank the guide’s authors and reviewers. Each has either served on the Committee or supported its work. Each has also had a role in creating the field of risk communication, producing its research foundations or making communications work in ways that are faithful to the science being communicated and to the needs of those whom it serves. We also thank the following publishers for kind permission to reuse figures: Elsevier (Chapter 4, figure 1 and Chapter 8, figure 2), John Wiley and Sons (Chapter 4, figure 2 and Chapter 8, figure 1), Nature Publishing Group (Chapter 4, figure 3), Lawrence Erlbaum Associates (Chapter 15), and University of California Press (print) and Lisa M. Schwartz (electronic) (Chapter 6, figure 1). Other figures were obtained from open sources such as governmental publications, created by the authors for this volume, or were owned by the authors for purposes of reuse in their own works. Published by the Food and Drug Administration (FDA), US Department of Health and Human Services, August 2011. Contributors to this compilation are past or current members or consultants of the FDA’s Risk Communication Advisory Committee. -
Cognitive Biases Potentially Affecting Judgment of Global Risks
MIRI MACHINE INTELLIGENCE RESEARCH INSTITUTE Cognitive Biases Potentially Affecting Judgment of Global Risks Eliezer Yudkowsky Machine Intelligence Research Institute Yudkowsky, Eliezer. 2008. “Cognitive Biases Potentially Affecting Judgment of Global Risks.” In Global Catastrophic Risks, edited by Nick Bostrom and Milan M. Ćirković, 91–119. New York: Oxford University Press. This version contains minor changes. Eliezer Yudkowsky 1. Introduction All else being equal, not many people would prefer to destroy the world. Even faceless corporations, meddling governments, reckless scientists, and other agents of doom re- quire a world in which to achieve their goals of profit, order, tenure, or other villainies. If our extinction proceeds slowly enough to allow a moment of horrified realization, the doers of the deed will likely be quite taken aback on realizing that they have actually destroyed the world. Therefore I suggest that if the Earth is destroyed, it will probably be by mistake. The systematic experimental study of reproducible errors of human reasoning, and what these errors reveal about underlying mental processes, is known as the heuristics and biases program in cognitive psychology. This program has made discoveries highly relevant to assessors of global catastrophic risks. Suppose you’re worried about the risk of Substance P, an explosive of planet-wrecking potency which will detonate if exposed to a strong radio signal. Luckily there’s a famous expert who discovered Substance P, spent the last thirty years working with it, and knows it better than anyone else in the world. You call up the expert and ask how strong the radio signal has to be. -
PAUL SLOVIC, Ph.D
UNITED STATES DISTRICT COURT FOR THE DISTRICT OF COLUMBIA ____________________________________ ) UNITED STATES OF AMERICA, ) ) Plaintiff, ) ) v. ) Civil Action ) No. 99-CV-02496 (GK) PHILIP MORRIS USA INC., ) f/k/a PHILIP MORRIS INC., et al., ) Next Scheduled Court Appearance: ) Trial (ongoing) Defendants. ) ____________________________________) REDACTED FOR PUBLIC FILING WRITTEN DIRECT EXAMINATION OF PAUL SLOVIC, Ph.D. SUBMITTED BY THE UNITED STATES PURSUANT TO ORDER #471 ________________________________________________________________________________________ Written Direct: Paul Slovic, Ph.D.: US v. PM, 99-cv-02496 (D.D.C.) (GK) 1 Q: Please state your name, for the record. 2 A: Dr. Paul Slovic. 3 Q: Dr. Slovic, please describe your higher education. 4 A: I received a Bachelors Degree in Psychology from Stanford University in 1959. I 5 obtained a Masters Degree in Psychology from the University of Michigan in 1962 and 6 my Ph.D. in Psychology from the University of Michigan in 1964. 7 Q: What is your current position? 8 A: In 1986, I became the President of Decision Research and accepted an invitation to 9 become a Professor of Psychology at the University of Oregon. I have served in these 10 positions since that time. 11 Q: Have you provided the Court with a copy of your curriculum vitae? 12 A: Yes, it is U.S. Exhibit 78,541. 13 Q: What is Decision Research? 14 A: Decision Research is a nonprofit research institute, which I established with two 15 colleagues in 1976, located in Eugene, Oregon and specializing in the study of human 16 judgment, decision making, and risk assessment. The research conducted at the Institute 17 is both theoretical and applied and is sponsored by U.S. -
Judged Terror Risk and Proximity to the World Trade Center
See discussions, stats, and author profiles for this publication at: http://www.researchgate.net/publication/5152353 Judged Terror Risk and Proximity to the World Trade Center. ARTICLE in JOURNAL OF RISK AND UNCERTAINTY · JANUARY 2003 Impact Factor: 1.53 · Source: RePEc CITATIONS READS 5 67 1 AUTHOR: Baruch Fischhoff Carnegie Mellon University 350 PUBLICATIONS 19,079 CITATIONS SEE PROFILE Available from: Baruch Fischhoff Retrieved on: 23 December 2015 The Journal of Risk and Uncertainty, 26:2/3; 137–151, 2003 c 2003 Kluwer Academic Publishers. Manufactured in The Netherlands. Judged Terror Risk and Proximity to the World Trade Center BARUCH FISCHHOFF∗ [email protected] ROXANA M. GONZALEZ DEBORAH A. SMALL JENNIFER S. LERNER Department of Social and Decision Sciences, Carnegie Mellon University, Pittsburgh, PA 15213 Abstract In November 2001, a nationally representative sample of Americans (N = 973, ages 13–88), queried via WebTVs at home, judged the probability of five terror-related events (e.g., being injured in an attack) and three “routine” risks (e.g., being a victim of other violent crime), in the following 12 months. Judgments of terror risks, but not routine risks, were related to whether respondents were within 100 mi of the World Trade Center. This relationship was found only in the following demographic groups, and not their complements: men, adults, whites, and Republicans. These differential responses to risk have both theoretical and policy implications. Keywords: risk perception, terrorism, gender, political affiliation, race, adolescents JEL Classification: C93, D78, D84, Z00 1. Introduction The terrorist attacks of 2001 injured or killed thousands of people in the United States. -
Adolescent Decision Making: Implications for Prevention Programs
DOCUMENT RESUME ED 441 185 CG 029 976 AUTHOR Fischhoff, Baruch, Ed.; Crowell, Nancy A., Ed.; Kipke, Michele, Ed. TITLE Adolescent Decision Making: Implications for Prevention Programs. Summary of a Workshop. INSTITUTION National Academy of Sciences, Washington, DC. SPONS AGENCY Department of Health and Human Services, Washington, DC. PUB DATE 1999-00-00 NOTE 31p. CONTRACT HHS-100-97-0028 AVAILABLE FROM National Academy Press, 2101 Constitution Ave., NW, Lockbox 285, Washington, DC 20055. Tel: 800-624-6242 (Toll Free); Tel: 202-334-3313; Web site: http://www.nap.edu. PUB TYPE Collected Works - Proceedings (021) EDRS PRICE MF01/PCO2 Plus Postage. DESCRIPTORS *Adolescents; At Risk Persons; Behavior Problems; *Decision Making; Mass Media Effects; Prevention; Programs; Workshops ABSTRACT Risk taking is a natural part of teenagers' lives. They need to take some risks in order to grow.However, they can also get into trouble with their risk taking when it involvesbehaviors such as sex, drinking, smoking, violence, and drug use. Interestin the role that decision making plays in adolescents' involvementin high-risk behaviors led the Office of the Assistant Secretary of Planningand Evaluation of the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services to request theBoard on Children, Youth, and Families to convene a workshop on adolescentdecision making. This booklet summarizes the workshop, held on January6-7, 1998, which was designed to pull together the diverse perspectivesthat researchers and practitioners have adopted in regard toadolescent decision making. It provides a brief overview of decision theory andhow decision theory might be applied to adolescent behavior. It nextconsiders cognitive, social, affective, and institutional factors that mayinfluence effective decision making. -
Profile of Paul Slovic PROFILE
PROFILE Profile of Paul Slovic PROFILE Farooq Ahmed, Science Writer On September 2, 2015, the image of three-year-old Syrian boy, Aylan Kurdi, lying face down on a Turkish beach sparked an international effort to aid refugees. Donations to charitable organizations surged, dwarf- ing the assistance to refugees since the violence in Syria began in 2011. Kurdi, however, was not the only person to drown that day in the Aegean Sea: Both his five-year-old brother and his mother died, as did several others. According to research by psychologist Paul Slovic, the international response would have been less charitable had the public seen the other drowned refugees. “If we had seen just one more individual, our compassion toward them all might have faded,” he explains. “Several psychological phenomena, includ- ing psychic numbing, would have made us care less about their plight.” Slovic, who was elected to the National Academy of Sciences in 2016, studies human decision making and motivation. His Inaugural Article dissects the response to Kurdi’s death, enumerating the psycho- logical obstacles to the human ability to care about mass atrocities. The article by Slovic et al. (1) also out- Paul Slovic. Image courtesy of Paul Slovic. lines techniques that can help face humanitarian crises without having to rely solely on compassion. A pro- psychometrics. Under Coombs, Slovic used gambles fessor of psychology at the University of Oregon since to understand how people make decisions. Slovic says 1986, Slovic also serves as the president of Decision a gamble “has elements that represent the risks of all Research, an institute that he helped found.