What Numbers Don´t Tell You (Correctly)

Richard PircherUniversity of Applied Sciences bfi Vienna

richard-pircher.net

A Quiz …

Count how many times the players wearing

white pass the ball

please don´t talk to your neighbour

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IGQmdoK_ZfY (second Video)

Focus

• To be able to focus on something is a valuable ability • To perceive all stimuli around us would

be far too much• To focus on something means

missing everything else• Numbers only may quantify what

is noticed as important(Most, Scholl, Cliffort & Simons, 2001 )

Invisible Gorilla

• Some people may know the first video with an invisible gorilla already• Do they realize the other

surprising details which are new in the second video?

The Monkey Business Illusion• Among those people who already knew

the first video with the Gorilla only 17 % took notice of the other two events=> they probably thought they knew the video already• Among those who didn´t know the first

video 29 % realized the curtain changing colour and the leaving player.

The Monkey Business Illusion

When you´re looking for a gorilla,

you often miss other unexpected events

The Monkey Business Illusion

Prior experiences and knowledge

may be misleading

Sensing the Future?• ¼ of our brains capacity is occupied with differentiating

valuable from irrelevant information• For this task the brain uses

expectations based on experiences from the past

• May we be sure thatnothing is missedwhich could be

important for the future?

Change Blindness Blindness

• The change blindness study• Most people firmly believe that they

would notice such large changes • We tend to be blind to our own

blindness • That’s a kind of

change blindness blindnesshttps://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Qb-gT6vDrmU&index=56&list=PL944828D6EF3E7530(Levin et al. 2000, Simons / Rensink 2005)

Change Blindness Blindness

• We don´t want to believe that we can be that easily manipulated• We want to believe in

everything which confirms our current beliefs and which• flatters our ego

Planning fallacyPeople tend to• underestimate the time, costs, and risks of future

actions and to overestimate the benefits of their own tasks (optimistic bias)

• overestimate the time needed as outside observers of somebody elses task (pessimistic bias)

• This phenomenon occurs regardless of the individual's knowledge that past tasks of a similar nature have taken longer to complete than generally planned.(Kahneman / Tversky 1979, Lovallo / Kahneman 2003)

Loneliness feels cold• One group of test persons is asked to recall an

experience of social exclusion within a larger test context

• The other group is asked to recall an experience of social inclusion

• With the pretext of a heating problem both groups were asked to estimate the room temperature

• Those who recalled the social exclusion experienced a significantly lower room temperature than those who recalled an inclusion experience

(Zhong & Leonardelli, 2008, Bargh / Shalev, 2012)

Emotional and social

contexts influence our perception and

judgment

The Unconscious Rules

• “Everyday intuitions suggest full conscious control of behavior, but conscious thought has little or no impact on behavior.”• In fact the unconscious strongly influences

our behaviour• It is plausible that almost every human

behavior comes from a mixture of conscious and unconscious processing

(Baumeister, Masicampo, & Vohs, 2011)

Thinking Too Little – Thinking Too Much

• Thinking too little causes – mistakes, errors and – actions which contradict other decisions and actions– Thinking is a kind of mental test run.

• Thinking too much leads to – a tunnel vision and narrow minded decisions– decisions which are easy to explain to others but are

not consistent with our own feelings and preferences any more

(Ariely / Norton, 2011, Nordgren et al., 2011)

Using the Best of Both WorldsSystem 1 – old and powerful(unconscious, intuitive)

System 2 – new and controllable(conscious, reflective)

Automatic, affective ControlledEffortless EffortfulAssociative DeductiveRapid, parallel Slow, serialProcess opaque Self-awareSkilled action Rule applicationConcrete, specific Neutral, abstractCausal propensities StatisticsPrototypes Sets

e.g.: DRIVING A CAR ON A WELL-KNOWN ROUTE

e.g.: FINDING THE BEST WAY TO DRIVE ROUND ROAD WORKS

Adapted from Kahneman / Frederick 2002

Using the Best of Both Worlds

Unconscious ressources may be integrated:• Sleep on decisions: during sleep the brain

consolidates information and connects it with prior knowledge

• Stop thinking about something and switch to non-cognitive activities: sports, nature, meditation, etc.

• Invite contradictive and diverse perspectives to identify blind spots instead of favoring mainly affirmative oppinions, e.g. through critical people, customers, etc.

The strengths of our unconscious resources

may be consciously integrated in everyday life

Take-away Guidelines1. Be aware that we usually focus on what we already

know. We overlook a lot which could be important for the future. Numbers only quantify what we already notice as being important.

2. Question current beliefs and the misleading power of your own ego. Knowledge may be distortive.

3. Use the best of both worlds: Consciousness and unconsciousness

4. Ask yourself the question: Am I thinking too little or am I thinking too much?

5. Use diverse and non-cognitive activities to enlarge perspectives and to identify blind spots

Richard PircherUniversity of Applied Sciences bfi Vienna, Austria

richard.pircher@fh-vie.ac.atrichard-pircher.net

Slides are available at de.slideshare.net/pircher

I would be glad to answer your questions and to discuss

the topic

Feel free to contact me!