Research report 2013 - Max Planck Institute for Human Development
Simple heuristics in a complex social world
Authors
Hertwig, Ralph; Hoffrage, Ulrich
Departments
Adaptive Rationalität (Ralph Hertwig)
Summary
Our social environments and the problems they entail can be utterly complex. But what does this mean for our decision behavior? Do complex problems necessarily require complex cognitive machinery? Researchers of the Center for Adaptive Rationality at the Max Planck Institute for Human Development show that also in social environments decision-making can benefit from simple rules of thumb, or heuristics, as well as from relying on just a few good pieces of information.