PSYC 2040 Chapter Notes - Chapter 14: Counterfactual Thinking, Availability Heuristic, Representativeness Heuristic

• School: University of Guelph
• Department: Psychology
• Course: PSYC 2040
• Professor: Dan Yarmey

Document Summary

Automatic thinking: a type of decision-making process that occurs at an unconscious or automatic level and is entirely effortless and unintentional. Heuristics: mental shortcuts that are often used to form judgements and make decisions. Controlled or effortful thinking: thinking that is effortful, conscious, and intentional. Social cognition: how people think about the social world, and in particular how people select, interpret, and use information to make judgements about the world. Study on articles results: articles that had very salient titles (birds of a feather flock together or opposites attract) were very influential on participants judgements. Articles with less appealing titles (research examines similarity as a source of liking) were given less weight in participants overall decision, even though the information contained in each research summary was the same. Study illustrates a particular type of shortcut, namely the availability heuristic. One of the most common shortcuts instead of relying on more objective information.