How You Decide: The Science of Human Decision Making

Learning what science reveals about human decision-making using the metaphor of manufacturing; informational raw materials go in; the cognitive machinery processes; control mechanisms guide the machinery; a decision is made.

Delving into the two-system model of decision-making; System 1 is the automatic and intuitive processor; it is an earlier system from an evolutionary perspective; System 2 is the flexible and powerful serial processor that one thinks of as "them".

Heuristics are the decision shortcuts that people use every day; they are powerful tools that allow one to make appropriate decisions fairly easily; not understanding the limitations of heuristics can easily lead one astray from the truth.

Habits are immediate automatic responses, good and bad, to situations; decision science gives the psychological framework within which to understand how habits form, how they are activated and how best to change them when needed.

The feeling that the mind is too overworked to make one more decision; the cognitive "fuel" needed for System 2 to rein in the automatic responses of System 1; how to recognize when one is too resource-depleted to make the best decisions.

Prospect Theory reveals the ways in which decision-making machinery values an item; how to make better decisions; understanding appropriate reference points; sensitivity to changes in value; super-sensitivity when it comes to potential loss.