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04 Dec 09

Dear God, please confirm what I already believe - life - 30 November 2009 - New Scientist

01 Dec 09

Stanford Marketing Research: Believe Me, I Have No Idea What I’m Talking About

  • "Our key finding," Tormala said, "is that although non-experts can become more persuasive by expressing high certainty about their opinions, experts can become more persuasive when they express some degree of uncertainty. Across several studies, we found that expert sources gained interest and influence by expressing minor doubts about their own opinion."
23 Nov 09

Daniel Finkelstein: Why do people disbelieve in global warming? | Daniel Finkelstein - Times Online

  • The hypothesis turned out to be correct. Some Conservatives answered, largely supporting the monetary control Bill and opposing the agricultural trade Bill. Some Labour supporters answered, revealing the opposite bias. But overall there was a weak but distinct relationship between less political knowledge and greater willingness to answer.
  • The second hypothesis was more startling. The authors believed that the more political knowledge you believe you have (as opposed to actually have), the more likely you were to answer. And this turned out to be strongly true. It was also true that if asked about your political knowledge before being asked the other questions, you were even more likely to respond on the fictitious bills.
07 Nov 09

Ellen Langer: Read Chapter One

  • In the 1970s my colleague Judith Rodin and I conducted an experiment with nursing home residents.1 We encouraged one group of participants to find ways to make more decisions for themselves. For example, they were allowed to choose where to receive visitors, and if and when to watch the movies that were shown at the home. Each also chose a houseplant to care for, and they were to decide where to place the plant in their room, as well as when and how much to water it. Our intent was to make the nursing home residents more mindful, to help them engage with the world and live their lives more fully.
  • A second, control group received no such instructions to make their own decisions; they were given houseplants but told that the nursing staff would care for them. A year and a half later, we found that members of the first group were more cheerful, active, and alert, based on a variety of tests we had administered both before and after the experiment. Allowing for the fact that they were all elderly and quite frail at the start, we were pleased that they were also much healthier: we were surprised, however, that less than half as many of the more engaged group had died than had those in the control group.
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02 Nov 09

If you only do one thing this week … learn to manage stress | Money | guardian.co.uk

  • If your stress is mild, there are steps you can take to keep it that way and minimise its effects.

    Start with the basics. Make sure you take regular breaks throughout the day, as well as regular holidays. Getting away from your workstation, even if it's just to make a cup of tea, can help you get a bit of perspective on a problem and relieve some of the physical stress you may accumulating while hunched over a piece of work.

  • Palmer also advocates talking to colleagues to keep things in perspective: "You might feel that missing a deadline is a huge disaster," he says. "Colleagues will help you realise that, while it might not be great, it really isn't the end of the world."
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Bob Sutton: Intuition vs. Data-Driven Decision-Making: Some Rough Ideas

  • The trouble with intuition is that we now have a HUGE
    pile of research on cognitive biases and related flaws in decision-making that
    show "gut feelings" are highly suspect.  Look-up confirmation bias --- people have a
    very hard time believing and remember evidence that contradicts their beliefs. There
    is also the fallacy of centrality, a lot more obscure, but important in that
    people -- especially those in authority -- believe that if something important
    happens, they will know about it.     
  • when people have the mindset to "act on their beliefs, while
    doubting what they know," so that they are always looking for
    contradictory evidence, encouraging those around them to challenge what they
    believe, and constantly updating (but always moving forward), then I think that
    intuition -- or acting on incomplete information, hunches, conclusions -- is
    right.
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