Daniel Kahneman

Thinking, Fast and Slow

Activity 1-3

Which is more deadly

• Strokes, accidental death
• Tornado, Asthma
• Lightning, Botulism
• Disease, accidental death
• Accidental death, diabetes
• In Israel: Terrorism or traffic deaths

Tom W. is a shy, nerdy, male graduate student.
Is Tom W. more likely to be a "computer science” major or a "business” major. Please choose one major.

Linda is a shy woman who loves poetry.
Is Linda more likely to study “Chinese literature” or “Business administration” Please choose one.

Is one combination of births MORE likely WHY?

• BBBGGG
• GGGGGG
• BGBBGB

ANSWERS

What comes to mind first

What comes to mind first

These are more deadly (statistically)

• Strokes
• Asthma
• Lightning
• Disease
• diabetes
• In Israel: traffic deaths

Matches stereotype or prototype

Tom W. is a shy, nerdy, male graduate student.
Tom W. more likely to be a "business” major because statistically, there are more "business" graduate students than computer science graduate students.

Linda is a shy woman who loves poetry.
Linda is statistically more likely to study “Business administration” over "Chinese Lit"

probability of patterns

ALL EQUALLY PROBABLE

• BBBGGG
• GGGGGG
• BGBBGB
• Random can have patterns although intuitively, we do not think so.
• Flip a coin to see probabilities of heads or tails
• Can get HHHHHT or TTTTTT

Activity 4

Measuring happiness

Explain correlation

• Control Group
• Coefficient of -0.12
• Asked for "life satisfaction" and
• "number of dates"

Explain correlation

• Experimental group
• Coefficient of 0.66
• Asked for "number of dates" and then
• "life satisfaction"

-0.12

0.66

If intuition is faulty?

Marriage associated with happiness

operational def

• If "lifetime satisfaction" associated with health, marriage, or income, people tended to have higher ratings.
• When Kahneman measured positive and negative emotions throughout one day (rather than one moment)
• married and single individuals had the same levels of happiness, saddness