Spring 2010

Psychology 209: Topics in Judgment and Decision Making

Prof. Craig McKenzie	Office: 2564A Mandler Hall	Hours: By appointment
Phone: 534-8075	Email: cmckenzie@ucsd.edu	URL: psy.ucsd.edu/~mckenzie/

Mondays, 2-5, Crick Conference Room, 3rd floor Mandler Hall

Course Overview: In the late '60s, the consensus regarding judgment under uncertainty was that people, by and large, behave in accord with normative (or rational) statistical models. In the early '70s, Tversky and Kahneman revolutionized thinking about this area by arguing that people rely on a few simple cognitive shortcuts (heuristics) that lead to systematic errors (biases). This new view led research in the area to mesh better with cognitive psychology by focusing on the cognitive processes underlying judgment. Although the heuristics-and-biases paradigm has had a large impact on all social sciences and some applied areas (e.g., business, law, medicine), it has come under constant attack. We'll discuss the paradigm, why it has come under constant attack, recent developments, and alternate perspectives.

Requirements: Thoughtful reading and discussion are required. Participants must do all the reading each week and come to class prepared to discuss it. Grades will be based on class participation. Short papers might also be required (in which case they will also influence grades).

Week 1 (March 29): Introduction to heuristics and biases

Peterson, C. R., & Beach, L. R. (1967). Man as an intuitive statistician. Psychological Bulletin, 68, 29-46. [pdf]

Edwards, W. (1982). Conservatism in human information processing. In D. Kahneman, P. Slovic, & A. Tversky (Eds.), Judgment under uncertainty: Heuristics and biases (pp. 359-369). Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. (Excerpts from a chapter in B. Kleinmuntz (Ed.), Formal representation of human judgment (pp. 17-52), 1968. New York: Wiley.) [pdf]

Kahneman, D., & Tversky, A. (1972). Subjective probability: A judgment of representativeness. Cognitive Psychology, 3, 430-454. [pdf]

Week 2 (April 5): Heuristics, biases, and some discontent

Tversky, A., & Kahneman, D. (1982). Judgment under uncertainty: Heuristics and biases. In D. Kahneman, P. Slovic, & A. Tversky (Eds.), Judgment under uncertainty: Heuristics and biases (pp. 3-20). Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. (Originally in Science, 1974, 185, 1124-1131.) [pdf]

Einhorn, H. J., & Hogarth, R. M. (1981). Behavioral decision theory: Processes of judgment and choice. Annual Review of Psychology, 32, 53-88. [pdf]

Week 3 (April 12): Defending and extending the paradigm

Kahneman, D., & Tversky, A. (1982). On the study of statistical intuitions. Cognition, 11, 123-141. [pdf]

Tversky, A., & Kahneman, D. (1983). Extensional versus intuitive reasoning: The conjunction fallacy in probability judgment. Psychological Review, 90, 293-315. [pdf]

Week 4 (April 19): More criticism

Funder, D. C. (1987). Errors and mistakes: Evaluating the accuracy of social judgment. Psychological Bulletin, 101, 75-90. [pdf]

Gigerenzer, G. (1991). On cognitive illusions and rationality. Poznan Studies in the Philosophy of the Sciences and the Humanities, 21, 225-249. [pdf]

Week 5 (April 26): Still more criticism; and a response

Gigerenzer, G. (1991). How to make cognitive illusions disappear: Beyond "heuristics and biases." European Review of Social Psychology, 2, 83-115. [pdf]

Kahneman, D., & Tversky, A. (1996). On the reality of cognitive illusions. Psychological Review, 103, 582-591. [pdf]

Gigerenzer, G. (1996). On narrow norms and vague heuristics: A reply to Kahneman and Tversky. Psychological Review, 103, 592-596. [pdf]

Week 6 (May 3): Some recent developments

Gilovich, T., & Griffin, D. (2002). Heuristics and biases: Then and now. In T. Gilovich, D. Griffin, and D. Kahneman (Eds.), Heuristics and biases: The psychology of intuitive judgment (pp. 1-18). Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. [pdf]

Kahneman, D. & Frederick, S. (2002). Representativeness revisited: Attribute substitution in intuitive judgment. In T. Gilovich, D. Griffin, and D. Kahneman (Eds.), Heuristics and biases: The psychology of intuitive judgment (pp. 49-81). Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. [pdf]

Week 7 (May 10): Affect heuristic

Slovic, P., Finucane, M., Peters, E., & MacGregor, D. G. (2002). The affect heuristic. In T. Gilovich, D. Griffin, and D. Kahneman (Eds.), Heuristics and biases: The psychology of intuitive judgment (pp. 397-420). Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. [pdf]

Loewenstein G. F., Weber E. U., Hsee C. K., & Welch N. (2001). Risk as feelings. Psychological Bulletin, 127, 267-286. [pdf]

Week 8 (May 17): Is poor performance more interesting than good performance?

Davis, M. S. (1971). That's interesting! Towards a phenomenology of sociology and a sociology of phenomenology. Philosophy of the Social Sciences, 1, 309-344. [pdf]

Christensen-Szalanski, J. J. J., & Beach, L. R. (1984). The citation bias: Fad and fashion in the judgment and decision literature. American Psychologist, 39, 75-78. [pdf]

Lopes, L. L. (1991). The rhetoric of irrationality. Theory & Psychology, 1, 65-82. [pdf]

Week 9 (May 24): Environmental structure, heuristics, and normative principles

Todd, P. M., & Gigerenzer, G. (2000). Precis of "Simple heuristics that make us smart". Behavioral and Brain Sciences, 23, 727-780. [pdf]

McKenzie, C. R. M. (2005). Judgment and decision making. In K. Lamberts and R. L. Goldstone (Eds.), Handbook of cognition (pp. 321-338). London: Sage. [pdf]

Week 10 (May 31): NO CLASS (Memorial Day holiday)