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Making Bad Decisions: The Science of Decision-Making

November 4, 2019

MAKING BAD DECISIONS

Ever wonder why you make such bad decisions. We make around 35,000 decisions every day, and they can’t all be good. There are many perspectives and exercises that we can explore as to why we make certain decisions, and, more importantly, why we think they are right!

NEUROLOGY AND ECONOMICS?

Our decision-making process has some innate problems. One of the major goals of neuroscientists is to better understand how information is represented in the brain, and how that information is interpreted and used for decision making. The brain is a powerful organ and requires the most amount of energy within the body. Because the brain performs so many mechanisms simultaneously. The efficient coding hypothesis is the process of the brain making predictions that allow neurons to better interpret and transmit information. Economists have spent many years studying the mechanisms behind irrational choices. With the emergence of books like Freakonomics, economic theory has been applied to a wide array of subjects.

Exercise #1: Picking a candy bar

Try this experiment with one of your friends.

  1. Go to the store, and get a variety of different candy bars. Make sure to get your friend’s favorite
  2. Place your friend’s favorite candy bar, and three other candy bars.
  3. Ask your friend to choose one of them. And record their choice.
  4. Now place all of the candy bars you have on the table.
  5. Ask your friend to choose the one they want. And record their choice.
  6. Now place your friend’s first choice and second choice on the table. See if they are the same or different.

This is an actual experiment that was done to see how people make decisions. When presented with a few options, participants would most often pick their favorite candy bar. However, when presented with over 20, they would often pick a candy bar that was not their favorite. When presented with their two choices, they would wonder why their decision variety between the two scenarios. This variability in decision making is what neuroscientists and economists seek to explore more of.

IRRATIONAL PSYCHOLOGY AND PHILOSOPHY

Exercise #2: Sellers and Choosers

Here is a game you can play with your friend.

  1. There are two mugs, one for you, and one for your friend.
  2. The mug is really nice, but you also have the option to sell it. Write down the price at which you are willing to sell your beautiful mug. You are the seller.
  3. Your friend can have the option of having a mug or the money for the mug. They write down a price they think the mug is worth. They are the chooser. If their price is higher than your price, then they get your mug.

This exercise is probably pretty confusing, but it shows something pretty cool

You may be wondering going with this and what it has to do with irrational decision-making.    Here’s the thing,  if we played this a thousands of times and put people in different roles – sometimes the role of Seller and sometimes in the role of a Chooser, we would find people who are in the role fo the seller who place the prices significantly higher than the chooser. This means that if the mug is already yours, thank you think it is worth a lot more than a similar mug that isn’t yours. This showcases the irrational logic that plagues our every decision.

STUPID TECHNOLOGY

Technology is currently taking a greater and greater role in our lives. Due to its presence, actions that were previously done analog or by hand, have now been replaced with technical substitutes. This has impacted much of how we make decisions. One of the key components of technology is its ability to collect large amounts of data, which outmatches the brain. But, just like we have difficulties making decisions based on the information gathered by our brain, this problem increases substantially with the data collection done by technology. While on the surface it appears more data available leads to better decisions, research has shown that this is not the case.

Exercise #3:

This exercise is simple. You probable are dependent on navigation tools to get you to point A and B. Pick a destination, and without look at provided directions list out the route someone would need to take. The destination very short! Now give this to your friend, and wait for them at the destination. See if the decisions that you made helped them get to the destination!

IT’S OK, WE AREN’T PERFECT

Making bad decisions is a part of our life experiences. I find it fascinating that within all our efforts to portray ourselves as rational beings, we are forever consumed by irrational decisions. Hopefully these exercises allow you to explore your decision making mechanisms, and gain new insight on how you think…and all the bad decisions you make!!

Sources:

https://dzone.com/articles/technology-and-decision-making-a-complex-relations

https://www.philosophytalk.org/blog/irrationality-human-decision-making

https://www.quantamagazine.org/the-neuroscience-behind-bad-decisions-20160823/

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Joshua Suber
About Author

4th Year Computational Media Major (also minoring in Industrial Design) at the Georgia Institute of Technology. In my free time, I like drawing, animation, and playing soccer.

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  Timothy Durham was convicted of rape when a test showed his DNA genotype matched the DNA recovered from the crime scene. Eye witnesses testified that Durham was in a different state at the time of the incident, but he wasn’t exonerated from his 3000 year sentence until follow up DNA analysis showed that the preliminary forensic analysis used in the trial was misinterpreted (Thomas et al.). DNA testing serves an invaluable part in our criminal justice system, but it comes with complications and bias that can lead to wrongful convictions and misinformed juries.  

Background:

Forensic genetics aims to identify the origin of a biological sample. It can be traced back to Karl Landsteiner who discovered human ABO blood groups. With blood groups, suspects could be eliminated based on their blood type. For example, if a suspect had type A blood and there was type B blood left at the scene by the perpetrator, the investigators could rule out the suspect. Unfortunately, the reverse didn’t work. If the suspect and perpetrator both had the same blood type, it can’t be concluded that the suspect was guilty. Blood identifiers evolved into 8 distinct categories which improved the ability to eliminate suspects, but could only conclude that (if the system matched) it might be the perpetrator or this person might be related to the perpetrator (Jobling and Gill). The field evolved in the 1980s with the discovery of Minisatellites, lines of repetitive DNA that don’t encode proteins. Minisatellite patterns in DNA create what we know today as the DNA fingerprint, and it has a much higher accuracy rate than previous methods (Augustyn et al.). Around the same time, a breakthrough for victims of sexual assault was discovered. In the case of assault, bodily fluids of both the victim and the assaulter can get mixed. A process called differential lysis was created which could selectively increase the concentration of sperm in a fluid sample thereby allowing for accurate DNA testing (Jobling and Gill). Forensics evolved to use single-locus probe testing after several years because of its ease of interpretation. It looked at specific minisatellites that had high variability between subjects. This was the first DNA-based method to be used in a criminal investigation. Two murder homicides from several years apart were connected using DNA evidence. The evidence was then used to exonerate an innocent man, and the guilty party was found when he tried to evade mandatory DNA testing for all men in the small town. His guilt was then reinforced when the DNA profiles matched, and he gave a confession (Jobling and Gill). Finding DNA at a crime scene doesn’t guarantee that you’ll find a murderer. There are issues with non-pure samples and limited samples that make DNA work difficult, and accreditation of facilities and new techniques and take time (Jobling and Gill).  

Subjectivity of DNA Interpretation:

In a 2009 publication, the National Academy of Science discusses the possibility for subjective influence in lab based forensics. The interpretation bias happens in complex cases where, for example, there could be a mixture of DNA. A study published in 2011 looked specifically at this issue. A gang rape happened in Georgia, and the mixture in DNA from the case was used to prosecute one suspect after another suspect took a plea bargain to testify against him. With DNA mixtures, there are three possible conclusions: suspect excluded, suspect cannot be excluded, and inconclusive. If the suspect is excluded, it means that there’s little to no possibility that his DNA is part of the sample. If the suspect cannot be excluded, it means that there’s a possibility that his DNA is part of the sample. In the trial, the DNA examiners who knew the context of the case concluded that the suspect being prosecuted could not be excluded. The 2011 study gave the DNA evidence from this case and the DNA profiles of the suspects to 17 forensic examiners. These examiners had no context of the case, and they all worked independently. Of the 17, only 1 came to the same conclusion (suspect cannot be excluded) as the examiners who knew the context of the case. Twelve of the 17 concluded that the suspect who was prosecuted and convicted had no relation to the DNA found in the sample. Not only does this show that subjectivity occurs due to the context of the case, but the 17 examiners came up with different findings based on their past experiences meaning that not all DNA analysis is objective. Some organizations like the Scientific Working Group on DNA Analysis Methods say that quantitative statistical evidence should be presented with every categorical conclusion, but the US doesn’t require this (Dror and Hampikian).

False Positives:

There are two categories that cause wrongful identification in a DNA report: coincidental matches and false positives. Coincidental matches are DNA matches between two unrelated people. The probability of these matches is about 1 to 500,000 for white individuals and about 1 to 350,000 for black individuals. This small probability of coincidental matches makes people feel confident in DNA evidence. False positives, on the other hand, are matches between DNA and test DNA that result from issues in the forensics lab. There have been multiple cases of forensics labs accidentally switching victim and suspected rapist DNA which lead to convictions that were later overturned when the lab realized the error. There are also cases of misreading or misunderstanding a sample. In a case from 1993, a man was convicted of rape because someone interpreted a mixed sample of victim and perpetrator DNA as an individual sample. The conviction was again overturned. To prevent false convictions, retesting DNA is allowed, but it’s not an efficient solution. Many people are pushing for statistical information on the probability of false positives, so that the jurors can make accurate judgements based on DNA evidence (Thomas et al.).  

Conclusion:

DNA analysis is a useful tool for the criminal justice system, but subjectivity can be an issue in forensic testing. To combat wrongful convictions, there are organizations like The Innocence Project who use DNA testing to free the innocent, but reformed forensic testing standards should be put in place to prevent subjectivity and to ensure juries are correctly informed during trials. https://www.innocenceproject.org/    

Citation:

Augustyn , Adam, et al. “DNA Finerprinting.” Encyclopedia Britannica , 26 Apr. 2018, www.britannica.com/science/DNA-fingerprinting#ref153186. Dror, Itiel E., and Greg Hampikian. “Subjectivity and Bias in Forensic DNA Mixture Interpretation.” Science & Justice, vol. 51, no. 4, 2011, pp. 204–208., doi:10.1016/j.scijus.2011.08.004. Jobling, Mark A., and Peter Gill. “Encoded Evidence: DNA in Forensic Analysis.” Nature Reviews: Genetics, vol. 5, no. 10, Oct. 2004, pp. 739–751., doi:10.1038/nrg1455. Thompson, William C, et al. “How the Probability of a False Positive Affects the Value of DNA Evidence.” Journal of Forensic Sciences, vol. 48, no. 1, Jan. 2003, pp. 1–8., doi:10.1520/jfs2001171.