Thinking through uncertainty: Nonconsequential reasoning and choice

by: Eldar Shafir, Amos Tversky

Cognitive Psychology, Vol. 24, No. 4. (October 1992), pp. 449-474.

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Abstract

When thinking under uncertainty, people often do not consider appropriately each of the relevant branches of a decision tree, as required by consequentialism. As a result they sometimes violate Savage's sure-thing principle. In the Prisoner's Dilemma game, for example, many subjects compete when they know that the opponent has competed and when they know that the opponent has cooperated, but cooperate when they do not know the opponent's response. Newcomb's Problem and Wason's selection task are also interpreted as manifestations of nonconsequential decision making and reasoning. The causes and implications of such behavior, and the notion of quasi-magical thinking, are discussed.

@article{citeulike:820142, abstract = {When thinking under uncertainty, people often do not consider appropriately each of the relevant branches of a decision tree, as required by consequentialism. As a result they sometimes violate Savage's sure-thing principle. In the Prisoner's Dilemma game, for example, many subjects compete when they know that the opponent has competed and when they know that the opponent has cooperated, but cooperate when they do not know the opponent's response. Newcomb's Problem and Wason's selection task are also interpreted as manifestations of nonconsequential decision making and reasoning. The causes and implications of such behavior, and the notion of quasi-magical thinking, are discussed.}, author = {Shafir, Eldar and Tversky, Amos }, citeulike-article-id = {820142}, doi = {http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/0010-0285(92)90015-T}, journal = {Cognitive Psychology}, keywords = {collective-action, qt}, month = {October}, number = {4}, pages = {449--474}, posted-at = {2006-08-28 21:05:34}, priority = {0}, title = {Thinking through uncertainty: Nonconsequential reasoning and choice}, url = {http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/0010-0285(92)90015-T}, volume = {24}, year = {1992} }

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TY - JOUR ID - citeulike:820142 L3 - citeulike-article-id:820142 N2 - When thinking under uncertainty, people often do not consider appropriately each of the relevant branches of a decision tree, as required by consequentialism. As a result they sometimes violate Savage's sure-thing principle. In the Prisoner's Dilemma game, for example, many subjects compete when they know that the opponent has competed and when they know that the opponent has cooperated, but cooperate when they do not know the opponent's response. Newcomb's Problem and Wason's selection task are also interpreted as manifestations of nonconsequential decision making and reasoning. The causes and implications of such behavior, and the notion of quasi-magical thinking, are discussed. IS - 4 JF - Cognitive Psychology EP - 474 TI - Thinking through uncertainty: Nonconsequential reasoning and choice VL - 24 SP - 449 KW - collective-action KW - qt AU - Shafir, Eldar AU - Tversky, Amos PY - 1992/10// UR - http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/0010-0285(92)90015-T ER -

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