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New Evidence Reveals Training Can Reduce Cognitive Bias And Improve Decision-making
Ever since Daniel Kahneman and Amos Tversky formalized the concept of cognitive bias in 1972, most empirical evidence has given credence to the claim that our brain is incapable of improving our decision-making abilities. Scientists regularly remind us of the many ways cognitive biases interfere with the choices we make. There have been over 50 Forbes articles linked to this scientific research focus in the past year alone. ... However, our latest field study, published by Psychological Science in September 2019, suggests that one-shot de-biasing training can significantly reduce the deleterious influence of cognitive bias on decision making.
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Screaming Into The Void: How Outrage Is Hijacking Our Culture, And Our Minds
Social media changed after the 2016 presidential election. "I felt myself getting sucked into feedback loops where I would read something, I would feel outraged about it, [and] I would feel compelled to share it with my friends," says Yale psychologist Molly Crockett. "I would then be sort of obsessively checking to see whether people had responded, how they had responded, you know, lather, rinse, repeat." Molly remembers feeling outraged in early 2017 by the anti-immigration stance of the Trump administration. She saw a friend post a pro-immigration article. After reading it, Molly decided to share it.
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THERE’S A SIMPLE WAY TO MAKE HEALTHY FOOD APPEALING
In a new study, researchers found that evocative labels such as “twisted citrus glazed carrots” and “ultimate chargrilled asparagus” can get people to choose and consume more vegetables than they otherwise would—as long as the food is prepared flavorfully. “This is radically different from our current cultural approach to healthy eating which, by focusing on health to the neglect of taste, inadvertently instills the mindset that healthy eating is tasteless and depriving,” says senior author Alia Crum, an assistant professor of psychology at Stanford University.
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We Need to Talk About ‘The Giving Tree’
Like many new parents, when our first child was born, we were delighted to receive gift boxes of tiny pajama sets, monogrammed baby blankets, and lots and lots of children’s books. We received seven copies of “Goodnight Moon” alone. By the time our second and third children arrived, we were proud owners of multiple copies of “The Giving Tree.” The Shel Silverstein book is a classic, and we were excited to share it with our kids — we thought it would be like revisiting an old friend from our own childhoods. But when we read it, something felt wrong.
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Why AI Is A Growing Part Of The Criminal Justice System
Facial recognition technology is all around us—it’s at concerts, airports, and apartment buildings. But its use by law enforcement agencies and courtrooms raises particular concerns about privacy, fairness, and bias, according to Jennifer Lynch, the Surveillance Litigation Director at the Electronic Frontier Foundation. Some studies have shown that some of the major facial recognition systems are inaccurate. Amazon’s software misidentified 28 members of Congress and matched them with criminal mugshots. These inaccuracies tend to be far worse for people of color and women.
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The Most Dangerous Way to Lose Yourself
When John F. Kennedy was 17, he was part of a prank club. At Connecticut’s elite Choate school in 1935, word spread that the group was planning to pile horse manure in the gymnasium. Before this “prank” could happen, the school’s headmaster confronted the troublesome boys. The scheme was the culmination of a list of offenses at the school, and young Kennedy was expelled. Though the sentence was eventually reduced to probation, the headmaster suggested that Kennedy see a “gland specialist” to help him “overcome this strange childishness.” The doctor Kennedy ended up seeing was Prescott Lecky, a young, mutton-chopped psychologist.
