Everyone has their own, limited, world view. The reason? Our brains simply cannot take in everything, at least not on a conscious level.
An Experiment
This idea is rather simple to demonstrate. First, choose a partner: a spouse, a friend, anyone who will cooperate. Then, before revealing the purpose of the experiment, each look around the present environment, a room, a garden, etc. and make a mental note of everything that is green. After that, have your partner close his or her eyes and relate everything they saw that was red. It will be difficult because the partner spent his or her energy focusing on green.
The point demonstrated by this experiment is that we tend to see what we want to see.
Bounded Judgements
The result of selective viewing is personal biases (e.g. inclined to one side of an issue), prejudices (e.g. judgements without due examination), and paradigms (e.g. patterns which influence how we view a situation: big is better; small is better).
To demonstrate paradigms further, the concept popularized by American psychologist Joel Barker (that everything that happens to us is processed by our brain and related to our own life experiences), let me refer to myself. I'm a geographer. As such, I'm well aware that different people may view a forest in different ways than I do, depending on their paradigms. For example, a hunter will see a forest as a good place to hunt game. A forester will assess a forest for its resource potential. A farmer will consider the forest as an obstacle that must be cleared before the land can be used for field crops. A city dweller may appreciate the forest for its natural beauty. A geographer, as an integrator will consider all views. Each person will have a different paradigm about forests.
Now, stop reading for a moment and look at yourself: list any personal biases, prejudices or paradigms you think you may have; perceptions based on your experiences and the teachings of your parents, teachers, and church etc. They are important to know because they affect your decisions.
As pointed out by the administration of Cite Man, "an accumulating body of research tells us that decision makers allow systematic biases and errors to creep into their judgements. These come out of attempts to shortcut the decision process." They further point out that, "to minimize effort and avoid difficult trade-offs," people rely too heavily on:
- experience
- impulses
- gut feelings
- convenient rules of thumb
Katherine L. Milkman of Harvard, and her colleagues call this "bounded judgements," or System 1 or Intuitive (fast, automatic and subconscious), in contrast to System 2 or reasoned (slow, conscious, logical) cognitive functioning.
The Issue of Subjectivity
We need to be aware, not just of our own biases and prejudices, but also of the viewpoints of others that influence our thinking.
The more we analyze media, for instance, the more we realize that all viewpoints and perspectives are, to some degree biased. As an audience, it is our job to recognize these biases. Only then can we understand and evaluate important issues that require reasoned decisions.
In investigating any issue, for instance, we come across a variety of information. In evaluating it, we must first analyze how subjective (opinion) or objective (factual) it is; whether it is reporting facts or expressing the writer's personal bias.
The Ratio of Facts to Opinions
Factual articles are those with substantiated evidence. They provide us with objective reporting, which allows us to form our own conclusions. Editorials, in contrast, are generally based on the writer's opinion. As such, they are subjective; they have biases.
When analyzing information to determine its level of objectivity, the following is a useful set of steps:
- Read an article once to get a general idea of the writer's point of view;
- Reread and highlight all the facts (e.g. citations, recognized fact) in one color;
- Read it a third time and highlight all the opinions (e.g. value judgements) in another color;
- Count up the number of facts and express this as a ratio to the number of opinions
This will give you a measure of how objective or subjective an article is:
- the greater the ratio of facts to opinions, the more objective it is;
- if opinions far outweigh the facts, the article is extremely biased.
If you are so inclined, rate this article; or perhaps the Cite Man article referenced above.
How to Improve Decision Making
So how can decision making be improved? How can people work at removing biases from their decision making? Milkman and her colleagues suggest the following:
- Preferences should be transitive and insensitive to minor changes in context;
- Revealed preferences (offered warnings of bias) should be consistent with stated preferences (stating direction of bias);
- Mathematical errors should not systematically arise;
- Upon cool, careful reflection, a decision maker should remain satisfied after making a choice that the decision he or she made was the right one;
- An optimal decision is one that a decision maker would regard as the right choice regardless of whether evaluating a personal decision or that of someone else.
Sources
- Common Biases and Errors in Decision Making Process. Citeman Network. Apr. 19, 2006.
- Joel A. Barker. The Paradigm Man. Joel Barker.com
- Katherine L. Milkman et al. How Can Decision Making Be Improved? Harvard Business School. 2008.
James Gibson - James Gibson is a retired teacher and small business owner. He is a published writer and has a wide spectrum of interests.
