Which of the following is most likely to occur during the pre editing phase of dominance structuring

CHAPTER 11

“Locals refuse to budge in battle with an oil company.” Hermosa Beach has a decision to make. It has been a long time coming, but the referendum is finally on the ballot. Will we permit E&B Natural Resources to drill for oil, or will we say no? Everyone has heard the arguments pro and con for years. E&B has the legal right to drill. So if the citizens say no, then the city must pay the oil company $17.5 million over the next 20 years. But, if the citizens say yes, then E&B will pay the city as much as $451 million spread over the next 35 years from the billions E&B will be making from the oil. E&B plans to sink 36 wells from a small site, about the size of three lots, located in a quiet res- idential neighborhood at 6th Street and Valley. The shafts will spider out below the homes and arc under the beach and the ocean floor to reach a vast oil deposit in the shale rock 3,000 feet down.1

Opponents warn that property values will plummet. Who will want to buy a house where there could be toxic spills? Think of the fire hazard, the health risks, the eye- sore, the constant noise, and the nasty oil odors fouling air we breathe. Think of globs of thick tarry oil washing on to the sandy beach with every wave. The oil company says the risks are being greatly exaggerated. New technologies and current laws make drilling safe and clean. Sound and sight abatement is already part of the plan. Other commu- nities are benefiting from drilling, why not Hermosa Beach too? Oh, and remember, the money. $3.8 million will go to the schools each year. The rest will go to parks, public ser- vices, and to put all the city’s ugly overhead utility wires

underground. These improvements will increase property values!

The interesting thing is that both sides are locked in. Neither side is listening to the other. Not anymore. Every “fact” is contested, every “study” is flawed, every claim is challenged, and every expert opinion is maligned. All motives are questioned. Yes, we will vote. But, no, we will not be doing any more System-2 deliberating.

For reasons that will be explained in this chapter, it is very hard for human beings to reverse a decision once made. The best opportunity to exercise our critical thinking is while we are still considering options. We can improve decision making by using our critical thinking skills and habits of mind to thoughtfully manage, monitor, and self- correct our own decision-making process. In this chap- ter we are focusing on the quality of the decision-making process. In the second part of this chapter we will explore specific strategies aimed at fostering reflective decision making. When the stakes are high and when we have the time to think things through carefully, our best chances for a good decision-making outcome is to call on the full power of our reflective System-2 thinking, that is on the full power of our critical thinking skills and habits of mind.

But, before getting into the decision-making strategies, we first will explore the psychological phenomenon that is the natural human tendency to lock into a decision. Once we commit to a given decision option, we gain confidence that our choice was the best one and that the other options would have been mistakes. Called dominance structuring,

this is an extremely valuable human characteristic. With confidence in the choice we have made, we are able to take action and to persevere during difficulties. We would hardly be able to accomplish anything were we to con- stantly reconsider every decision and change our minds. Our natural tendency toward dominance structuring helps us to be resolute and to sustain our commitments. But with the benefits come risks. Because dominance structuring tends to lock us into a decision, this tendency can occasion- ally lock us into an unwise decision. The critical thinking skill of self-regulation and the habit of truth-seeking are our best hopes for identifying those occasions and guard- ing against hanging onto poor decisions. In this chapter we first unpack dominance structuring so we can see how it works. Then we consider critical thinking strategies for managing the potentially negative consequences of prema- ture dominance structuring.

11.1 Dominance Structuring: A Fortress of Conviction

Once human beings have made a decision, we almost never change our minds. Looking back on our choice as compared to other options, we often feel that ours was so obvious and others were so poor that it is a wonder that we considered them possibilities at all. Maybe we do not need to work on the skill of self-regulation after all because we are seldom, if ever, wrong. We say to ourselves, “Others may disagree, but that’s their issue.” Things may not turn out as we had expected, but that’s just bad luck or someone else’s screwup. Right? Be honest; there are plenty of times when we all have thought exactly that. Why? Part of the answer may be that we really do a good job of making sound decisions. And part of the answer, whether our decisions are objectively wise or foolish, is our tendency toward dominance structuring. To appreciate the thought- shaping influences of dominance structuring, consider the arguments presented in this next example.

“I Would Definitely

Go to the Doctor”

A woman who has made a decision was invited to describe her decision-making process in detail to a trained inter- viewer. The narrative below is a brief excerpt from the transcription of that much longer interview.2 The inter- viewer and the woman are talking about the possibility that she might discover a worrisome lump during a breast self-examination. The excerpt begins with the interviewer asking the woman whether she would go to see her health care provider if she were to discover a change in her body that caused her to worry about the possibility of breast cancer.

IntervIewer: “You’re very religious. Could you see your- self waiting a while before going to the doctor and praying instead?”

respondent: “Oh, no. For one thing, God is a wonderful God; he made doctors. You know, my mother-in-law— I’m divorced, I was married then—she had had a heart attack. And, she definitely would pray instead of go to the doctor. She loved the Lord, and she remained in God’s will [and was fortunate not to die]. But at times people have to understand that God doesn’t make things as complicated as people kind of want to make it. And it’s not about religion; it’s about God, your per- sonal relationship with Him. And God, He made some [people] become doctors to want to help. You know that’s how I feel. You know, I’ll say this until the day I die and go back to the Lord. I’m a practicing Christian; I love the Lord. I just know God works within com- mon sense. That’s why He gave us a brain, you know. And I would definitely go to the doctor. “

Review the decision map showing the respondent’s arguments. For this individual the option not selected (“I would pray for a while instead of going to the doctor”) has virtually no support. She considers whether going to the doctor means that she is not being sufficiently trusting in God, but abandons that line of reasoning. She is pulled by the availability heuristic as she recalls what her mother- in-law would do, but she resists that pull, saying that God does not make things that complicated. Although in the end she offers only two arguments directly supporting her decision, it is clear from the interview and the map that all her thinking has moved inexorably and confidently in that direction. Not going to the doctor is, for her, not really an option. The problem in her mind was how to explain that to her deeply religious friends.

Were we to evaluate the arguments the woman makes using the standards and strategies presented in Chapter 7 entitled “Evaluate Arguments: Four Basic Tests,” we would find them wanting. For example, comparing herself to her mother-in-law could well have led the respondent

to infer that she did not need to see the doctor right away. The mother-in-law, a close family member, and, like her- self, a woman of faith with a potentially severe illness, would delay seeking medical help. Ergo, following out the analogy, the woman being interviewed should also delay. The respondent’s other arguments rely on belief statements about what God intends or how complicated God wishes things. But humans cannot know the mind of God. Therefore, we cannot establish the truth of premises about what God may want, intend, or think. This makes the soundness of those two arguments highly question- able. And yet, whatever their individual logical weak- nesses might be, taken together her arguments are, for her,

persuasive explanations that she would indeed go to the doctor. She is firm in that decision. From the longer narra- tive, which is not reproduced here, we can infer that she is not an uneducated or illogical person; therefore to under- stand what is happening we have to dig deeper into her purposes for telling the story as she does.

As it turns out, this woman is using her reasoning skills to explain a decision, not to make a decision. Going to the doctor was always to her the more sensible of the two choices. For her this was a System-1 decision—Sick? Go to the doctor! What she needed to do was explain that choice in the light of her deeply religious views and in the context of having relatives (and perhaps friends) who use

religion to delay seeing a doctor for a possibly dangerous symptom. Her cognitive challenge was actually rather for- midable. She had to deal with the issue that some of her friends and the people at her church would interpret her going to the doctor as showing that her faith was weak. Notice that she does not bother to explain why going to the doctor would be valuable to her health, only why it’s OK not to leave it to God. And also notice that she is not doubting her faith. But she does achieve her goal of creat- ing a rationale to support her preferred option.

Explaining and Defending

Ourselves

Our thinking capacities helped us survive as a species through the many millennia when we were anything but the most formidable species on the planet. Today our capacity for problem solving and decision making helps us achieve our personal goals, whatever they may be. If

learning the truth helps achieve our goals, then we apply our skills to the problem of learning the truth. If needing to feel justified that we have made the right decision, particu- larly if that decision cost people their lives, is vital, we will apply our thinking skills toward creating and sustaining that justification.

Objectivity in decision making is something we prize. Yet objectivity can be very difficult for us when we already have a strongly held opinion on a given issue. Truth-seeking and open-mindedness incline us toward objectivity in the application of our skills of analysis, interpretation, evaluation, inference, and explanation. But unless we also invoke the sixth critical thinking skill, self- regulation, we may fail to achieve the objectivity we seek.

a Poorly Crafted assignment For many years I gave my students critical thinking assignments expressed like this example: “Gun control is a controversial issue in our nation. Take a position for or against legislationbanning all sales of handguns. Research the issue and defend your position with the best arguments possible. In doing so, please consider the arguments for the other side and explain why they are mistaken.”

As it turned out, that was a terrible way to give a critical thinking assignment. Why? Because my students would do exactly what I had asked, in exactly that order. If they did not already have a point of view on the matter, they would first take one side or the other. Often their System-1 heuristic thinking played a big role in deter- mining which side they took. Some were “pro-gun” and some had poignant personal stories of gun violence that made them “anti-gun.” Some would knock one side or the other out of contention in their minds using the one-rule decision-making tactics of elimination by aspect: “If she’d had a gun to protect herself, she’d be alive today” or “You don’t need an automatic pistol to hunt deer.” Then, after they had taken a side in their minds, they would search for reasons and information that supported their point of view, but not reasons or information that opposed the view they had adopted. This was energetic investiga- tion, but it was neither truth-seeking nor fair-minded. Their minds were pretty much already made up on the subject. Next they would write a paper laying out all the good reasons for their points of view. But, no matter which side they took, they struggled to say anything good about the opposing point of view. Their papers, by the way, were often well organized and logically presented. Like the woman talking about her decision to see the doc- tor, my students could explain their decisions and defend them. But they had not reflected on whether or not they were the best decisions. Critical thinking is not the holding of a belief; it is the process of reflective judgment by which we come to the belief.

The problem was my own, not my students’. I wanted my students to give due consideration to both sides of a controversial issue and to think about it in a fair-minded, objective, informed, and well-reasoned way. But that was not what the instructions said. What I had done instead was invite students to build a dominance structure around one option and to bolster their perspective by fending off all counterarguments. I should have said, “The right to bear arms has become a major issue in our country. Come to class on Monday next week prepared to discuss this issue. I may ask you to take either the pro side or the con side with regard to a possible piece of legislation relating to gun control. Open your mind to either possibility. Be ready to present either side effectively. And be ready for the third possibility, which is that I will assign you to listen and then to adjudicate the class discussion by evaluating objectively the reasoning presented by your peers. Study the issue, inform yourself about the arguments in favor of and opposed to gun control. Be ready to speak intelligently and fair-mindedly on the topic of the right to bear arms

and gun control legislation, no matter which of the three jobs I give you on Monday in class.” If critical thinking is a process, then I should have found a way for my students to demonstrate that they are able to interpret, analyze, infer, explain, evaluate, and self-regulate. Only after the full, informed, and fair-minded discussion would it have made sense to invite students to then take a reasoned posi- tion on the matter.

“A fanatic is one who can’t change his mind and won’t change the subject.”

Winston Churchill3

The challenge for critical thinking is not unlike the problem of building a new house on a lot where an older house already stands. Without doing damage to the land or the neighborhood, we need to remove the old house, salvaging anything that may be of value, before we can build the new house. It takes similar skill and sensitivity to perform the same operation on opinions. Truth-seeking and open-mindedness need to be cultivated as much as possible so that we can be prepared to revisit our opinions with objectivity and judiciousness. In my life there have been more than a few times when my dearly held but ulti- mately mistaken opinions on controversial matters had to be abandoned so that sounder, more informed, and better- reasoned opinions could take their rightful place. But it is never easy to change one’s mind about an opinion that has been firmly held—and this makes the job of self-regulation that much more difficult. To understand why most of us have a very hard time changing our minds, let’s explore the psychological process of deciding on “the best avail- able option.”

Moving from Decision to Action

Whenever we are presented with a problem, our cognitive heuristics and our capacity for logical reasoning play criti- cal roles in the natural human quest to find some resolu- tion that we can assert with plausible confidence to be our best available option. We shall call this option the dominant or superior option in any given context. In decision mak- ing we move, more or less quickly, through a process that includes sorting through options. We discard the implau- sible ones, identify one or more promising options, evalu- ate it or them on the basis of our decision-critical criteria,4 and select the option we come to judge to be superior.5 Psychological research by Henry Montgomery and others, as we shall see, is consistent with the idea that both argu- ment making and cognitive heuristics are central factors in our search for a dominant option—to move us from cognition to action. In times of uncertainty, when action is needed, dominance structuring is a necessary strategy for

deciding between alternatives and swinging into action. Montgomery describes the human search for a single dominant option among our many possible choices in any given context as having four phases:

• pre-editing

experience, education, employment test scores, and the like. We may have a concrete set of characteristics in mind for the final choice: someone with strong communication skills, enthusiasm for the position, and a schedule that per- mits that person to work the hours we might require. Our selection of these criteria shows good reasoning, for they are in fact crucial to finding the best person for the job. And we expect further evidence of reasoning in the systematic approach taken to identify potential candidates by adver- tising the position and screening the applicants to cull the list down to a group of interviewees. But when the applica- tions come in, we don’t exhaustively rate every candidate on every decision-critical attribute. Rather, at this early pre-editing stage we look for reasonable ways to make the decision easier and more efficient. We eliminate as many alternatives as possible with as minimal an expenditure of effort as must be committed to the task.

• • •

identifying one promising option testing that promising option for dominance structuring the dominance of the option selected6

Phase 1: Pre-editing In the pre-editing phase, we start by selecting a group of possible options and a number of attributes that we think are going to be important as we decide which option to finally pick. Take, for example, the problem of hiring one new employee from a large applicant pool. We want to interview only a small group of highly qualified candidates. We want them to have relevant work

experience, education, employment test scores, and the like. We may have a concrete set of characteristics in mind for the final choice: someone with strong communication skills, enthusiasm for the position, and a schedule that per- mits that person to work the hours we might require. Our selection of these criteria shows good reasoning, for they are in fact crucial to finding the best person for the job. And we expect further evidence of reasoning in the systematic approach taken to identify potential candidates by adver- tising the position and screening the applicants to cull the list down to a group of interviewees. But when the applica- tions come in, we don’t exhaustively rate every candidate on every decision-critical attribute. Rather, at this early pre-editing stage we look for reasonable ways to make the decision easier and more efficient. We eliminate as many alternatives as possible with as minimal an expenditure of effort as must be committed to the task.

Typically, we use the elimination by aspect heuristic and the satisficing heuristic to make our work go more quickly. We toss every applicant who is missing any single qualifying condition (insufficient education, low employ- ment test scores, or no relevant work experience), and we retain only those we judge to be good enough for a second look. We may cluster the applications into broad categories such as “well-qualified,” “qualified,” and “marginal.” If we do cluster them like that, we will quickly eliminate all but the “well-qualified.” Pre-editing can be brutally expe- ditious, and yet there is good reason for this. In real life we do not have the time or the resources to deliberate in detail about the cases we already know are not going to make the cut. What’s the point?

Our natural eagerness to shortcut through large num- bers of options was captured in a lyric from “The Boxer” by Paul Simon and Art Garfunkel, where the poets said that we tend to hear what we want or expect to hear and then to ignore or disregard all the rest.

Phase 2: identifying one Promising oPtion The second phase of the search for dominance is the identifica- tion of a promising option. We do this by finding one alter- native that is more attractive than the others on at least one critically important attribute. There are many reasons why one choice may emerge as very attractive and be judged optimal. Perhaps this choice is most in tune with our val- ues or current desires. Or perhaps the choice is the least threatening or the most economical. Whatever the source of the attraction, once this choice is identified, it becomes our “favored” or “promising” option. Using our hiring example, suppose there are four finalists who have passed through our initial screening process, and we plan that a committee will interview them all. And suppose that can- didate number one has the most job experience, number

two is most energetic, number three is most analytical, and number four is the most congenial. It is possible the com- mittee will immediately discover its consensus candidate. But it is more likely that different members of the commit- tee will find different candidates to be optimal for differ- ent reasons. Each member of the committee has a different favorite. Thus, the stage is set for a difference of opinion as to which candidate should be the one hired.

Phase 3: testing the Promising oPtion Having identified a promising option, we begin almost imme- diately to test it against the other options. We do this by comparing our promising alternative to the other options in terms of the set of decision-critical attributes. Typically, we focus on seeing whether our promising option has any salient disadvantages or major drawbacks. Returning to our hiring example, suppose that five years of relevant work experience is a decision-critical criterion. If our favored candidate has seven years of relevant work expe- rience, we will interpret that to mean that our candidate is not at a disadvantage on that criterion. That our candi- date may not have as many years of experience as some other candidate is not a problem. We are not going to argue the potential positive advantage of more years beyond the minimum five. Our focus will only be to assure ourselves that our favored option does not fall short of the mark on any decision-critical factor. But what if our candidate does fall short? In that case some of us may argue that the disad- vantage is not fatal to our favorite’s candidacy. In fact, if we are attracted to candidate number four because of his or her congeniality, we are likely to argue that even if candidate four has only two years of experience, this is really more than enough. At this point, we are not looking to prove that our candidate is the best; rather we want to be sure that our candidate has no fatal flaws.

If our promising alternative is “comparable to the others,” “about as good as the others,” “neither bet- ter nor worse than the others,” or “good enough” on the other decision-critical attributes, the promising alterna- tive becomes the “to be chosen” alternative. Our initial preference for that candidate, who was the first one we found whom we liked, wins out. We become more and more firm in our choice. We will not abandon our “to-be-chosen” option easily. Once we begin to appraise and anchor on a given promising option, we seek to establish a rationale for selecting this promising or “to-be-chosen” option over the others, and this means we transition nearly seamlessly into phase 4.7

The detective “began to worry that he was ‘locking in,’ a problem he saw with other cops all the time, the sure sense that something was just so, when it wasn’t.”

John Sandford, Mortal Pre.

Phase4:fortifyingtheto-Be-ChosenoPtion In the final phase, we restructure our appraisals of the options so as to achieve the dominance of one option over the others.8 This restructuring can be more or less rational, more or less in touch with reality, and, hence, more or less likely to lead to the intended and desirable results.9 One way we restructure the decision so that our “to-be-chosen” candi- date comes out on top is by de-emphasizing those deci- sion-critical attributes on which our promising candidate may be weaker. Another way is to bolster our candidate by increasing the significance of an attribute on which our candidate is stronger. A third way is to collapse attributes into larger groupings; for example, we could combine edu- cation and job experience into the single attribute, “back- ground experience.” Now we can hire someone with more education but very little job experience, overriding our concern for job experience per se. Or, because we do not favor candidate number one who has the most job experi- ence, we may need to diminish this apparent strength. We might argue that work experience is an advantage of can- didate number one, but some detail about that work expe- rience (for instance, that the person had never served in a supervisory role) is a disadvantage, so the one can be said to cancel the other. And, because of this, we might argue, candidate number one is not the person to hire.

The process of de-emphasizing, bolstering, trading off, and collapsing attributes continues until we find that one alterna- tive stands above the others as the dominant choice. Acute reasoning skills are vital to this complex and dynamic pro- cess of making comparisons across attributes. Obviously, one might be able to quantify within a given attribute—for example, by comparing two candidates on the basis of their years of relevant background experience. But it is not clear

how one would compare—for the purposes of possible trade-offs— communication skills against, say, energy or loyalty. And yet, we will make arguments in support of the to-be-chosen alternative as the decision maker’s search continues for a dominance structure to support this choice above all others.10 When the decision is being made by committee, and the stakes are high, this process can become interpersonally difficult, stressful, political, and, in the

worst situations, ruthless. When is dominance struc-

turing complete? There are three indicators. First, unless they are intentionally dissembling, peo-

ple who have made their choice will tend to describe themselves as having decided, rather than as still thinking or as undecided. Second, people who are locked into a given choice tend to dismiss as unimportant, refute, or abandon all arguments that appear to be lead- ing to a decision other than the one they embrace. Third, when asked to explain their choice, people who have built a dominance structure to fortify their selection often pres- ent with some enthusiasm a plurality of arguments sup- porting their chosen decision and they tend to recite rather unconvincingly a minimum number of arguments sup-

porting any of the other possible options.

Benefits and Risks of Dominance

Structuring

The result of dominance structuring is confidence, whether reasonable or unreasonable, in the option we have decided upon. Dominance structuring supplies us with enough confidence to motivate us to act on our decisions and to sustain our efforts. Obviously, the more unreasonable,

biased, irrational, and unrealistic we have been in our dominance structuring, the greater the risks of a poor deci- sion. On the other hand, if we have made the effort to be reasonable, truth-seeking, informed, open-minded, and neither too hasty nor too leisurely in coming to our deci- sion, then there is a greater chance that the decision will be a wise one. And we would be foolish not to be confident in it and not to act on the basis of such a decision. It is hard to know what more we could want when we need to make an important decision that involves elements of risk and uncertainty.

It would be a mistake to think of this human process as intentionally self-deceiving or consciously unethical or unfair. Rather, what cognitive scientists like Montgomery offer is a description of how human beings bolster confi- dence in their judgments under conditions of uncertainty. Humans seek to establish a strong and enduring rationale for the belief that one alternative dominates over others. This strong rationale impels us to act and sustains our con- tinuing to act on the basis of that belief. We surround our choice with a rationale for its enduring superiority to the other choices. This strategy allows us then to move for- ward, with confidence in the quality of our decision.

Understanding the power of dominance structuring explains why it is so difficult for us to reconsider a choice once it has been made or why the criticisms of our choices seem unpersuasive. Once we have dominance structured around a choice, the virtues of other options are less compel- ling to us and their vices appear larger than they may in fact be. When the dominance structure has been created, it is not uncommon to hear people describe the results of their delib- erations with phrases like “When we looked at it, we really didn’t have any other choice,” or “Hey, at the end of the day it was a no-brainer!” These mantras are evidence that the decision maker has elevated one option to the top position and discredited or discounted all other options. Having done that, it often is unclear to the decision maker why any of the other options were ever considered viable in the first place.

Searching for dominance in conjunction with elimina- tion by aspect, satisficing, and anchoring with adjustment involves cognitive risks. First, we risk making poor deci- sions due to a lack of due consideration of all reasonable alternatives. Second, we risk being blind to the chance that our choice might be seriously flawed or need revision. At some level, we recognize these potential problems in human decision making. Our judicial system, for example,

generally provides for appeals to be made to some person or judicial panel other than the one that rendered the ini- tial decision. We know that once people have fixed their minds on given results, it is very difficult for them to change their judgment. In everyday life, who is there to review our decisions for us if we do not do have the habit of truth-seeking and the skill of self-regulation so that we can review them ourselves?

Dominance structuring is a powerful influence on individual and group decision making. Our discussion may seem a harsh critique of human decision making. However, no rebuke is implied or intended. Nor is any praise. The description of dominance structuring is meant to be exactly that: a description of how human decision making works based on empirical investigations. At times we do well, at other times not.

OK, given that we humans naturally engage in dominance structuring, and given that the process has many benefits but some risks, does that mean that we cannot improve our decision making? No. Developing strength in critical thinking is all about improving our decision making process. We are human beings, not machines, so we are not going to replace dominance structuring with some other process. But we can adapt. The question for strong critical thinkers with a positive habit of truth-seeking becomes “What steps can we take to improve our decision making process and realize better outcomes given that we tend toward dominance structuring?”

11.2 Self-Regulation Critical Thinking

Skill Strategies

Because dominance structuring is an automatic System-1 tendency, we do not ask ourselves whether we wish to engage in dominance structuring or not. We just do it. And, again, for the most part that is a good thing, par- ticularly in contexts of uncertainty when a decision is needed and action is required. But, sometimes, prema- ture dominance structuring is a mistake. It can lock us into a less than optimal decision. Fortunately, System-2 decision making is capable of overriding and inter- vening. There are many strategies to mitigate the risks of dominance structuring around a less than optimal choice. These strategies rely on the critical thinking skill of self-regulation. Using self-regulation we can moni- tor our individual and group decision making, and we can make corrections in our decision-making processes to protect ourselves against premature dominance struc- turing around a lesser option. Some of these strategies will be familiar and obvious, but others may be new to you. What’s important is that we use our self-regulation skills to monitor decision making and make midcourse corrections should we begin to lock in prematurely. And that can happen, because our preferred option, after all, appears to be rather strong as compared to the others.

“Ongoing cognitive debiasing [e.g. monitoring one’s own thinking for errors and self-correcting] is arguably the most important feature of the [strong] critical thinker and the well-calibrated mind.”

Pat Croskerry, Geeta Singhai, and Silvia Mamede11

So, we will be tempted to take shortcuts and to achieve closure prematurely on our preferred option, fortifying it psychologically even against the onslaught of our origi- nal precautionary intentions.

Precautions When Pre-Editing

Be sure aBout “the ProBlem” What we take to be the problem can limit our imaginations about possible solutions. For example, if the problem is “Our team is not going to meet the deadline,” our solutions include work- ing harder, putting in more time, or reducing the quality of the work to complete it on time. But if the problem is “Roy is not doing his share of the work,” then our solu- tions include talking with Roy about the importance to the team of his fulfilling his responsibilities, giving some of Roy’s work to other team members, replacing Roy on the team, or excluding Roy from the work effort and the resulting credit for the team’s accomplishments. As we saw in Chapter 2 entitled “Critical Thinking Mindset and Skills” the crew of Apollo 13 was

flight is, in your judgment, a requirement for your next vacation trip, then don’t compromise on that standard. On the other hand, if a non-stop flight is desirable but not essential, then don’t elevate a secondary criterion to the level of “mandatory.” If the decision must be made after you hear from your friend next week on Monday, but before the opportunity lapses next week Thursday, then hold to that time frame. People with strong critical thinking skills and habits of mind protect themselves from making suboptimal decisions by establishing primary and secondary criteria and negotiating the secondary ones but holding firm to the primary ones.

Be Clear aBout Why an oPtion is in or out Even at the pre-editing phase, make a reflective and deliberative judgment as to why each option should remain in conten- tion or be eliminated. It will be impossible in most cases to give full consideration to every conceivable option. We need to eliminate large numbers of options early in the process so we can conserve time and energy to focus on those that remain. Real estate salespeople know this, and so they will ask prospective buyers and renters about their price range and how many bedrooms they need. These two parameters alone will enable agents to avoid wasting their own time and their clients’ time on properties that are too expensive or not the right size.

able to identify the right prob- lem; it was the oxygen. But if they had interpreted the prob- lem to be instrumentation, it is difficult to see how they would have survived. Through train- ing and experience, we learn all sorts of ways of solving all kinds of problems. But if we interpret the problem incorrectly, we are very apt to decide upon a solu- tion that will be ineffective or inappropriate.

Suppose you are looking to rent a two-bedroom apartment for less than $900 per month near school. A computer search or a friend who is a real estate agent can provide a list of a dozen apartments within minutes. Because you were clear about why an option was in (near the campus, two bedrooms) and why an option was out (cost more than $900), each and every one of the apartments will be a viable possibility. Your chances of making a poor decision or falling in love with a place you cannot afford or that does not meet your needs are reduced considerably. Suppose that a safe neighborhood and proximity to the metro system are also major considerations for you. Now, with clarity about five criteria, the choices become fewer and the next step, identifying the promising option, is more

manageable.

sPeCify the CritiCalattriButes Before beginning to work on a solution, be clear about the standards to be applied when evaluating options and minimum thresholds that an acceptable option must meet. If two years of work experience is an expectation for hiring, then say so and stick to it. If a non-stop

flight is, in your judgment, a requirement for your next vacation trip, then don’t compromise on that standard. On the other hand, if a non-stop flight is desirable but not essential, then don’t elevate a secondary criterion to the level of “mandatory.” If the decision must be made after you hear from your friend next week on Monday, but before the opportunity lapses next week Thursday, then hold to that time frame. People with strong critical thinking skills and habits of mind protect themselves from making suboptimal decisions by establishing primary and secondary criteria and negotiating the secondary ones but holding firm to the primary ones.

Be Clear aBout Why an oPtion is in or out Even at the pre-editing phase, make a reflective and deliberative judgment as to why each option should remain in conten- tion or be eliminated. It will be impossible in most cases to give full consideration to every conceivable option. We need to eliminate large numbers of options early in the process so we can conserve time and energy to focus on those that remain. Real estate salespeople know this, and so they will ask prospective buyers and renters about their price range and how many bedrooms they need. These two parameters alone will enable agents to avoid wasting their own time and their clients’ time on properties that are too expensive or not the right size.

Suppose you are looking to rent a two-bedroom apartment for less than $900 per month near school. A computer search or a friend who is a real estate agent can provide a list of a dozen apartments within minutes. Because you were clear about why an option was in (near the campus, two bedrooms) and why an option was out (cost more than $900), each and every one of the apartments will be a viable possibility. Your chances of making a poor decision or falling in love with a place you cannot afford or that does not meet your needs are reduced considerably. Suppose that a safe neighborhood and proximity to the metro system are also major considerations for you. Now, with clarity about five criteria, the choices become fewer and the next step, identifying the promising option, is more

manageable.

Precautions When Identifying

the Promising Option

sCrutinize oPtions With disCiPlined imPartiality When you first start considering a prob- lem, it is too soon to become the champion of one alterna- tive over another, and you’ll need to discipline yourself to assess strengths and weaknesses without becoming enam- ored of any specific option. If there are four apartments to look at, prepare your mind to look objectively at each. In practice, this can be more difficult than it seems, especially because many professional real estate agents often use the following tactics. First, an agent shows an acceptable property, a weaker one second, the best one third, and a lesser-quality property fourth. Psychologically, this puts the client at ease because, after two less-than-fully-desir- able options, the third option looks really good, adjusting upward from where the client had first anchored. Seeing a less-acceptable fourth option helps lock the client in on the third option. Although the salesperson may never have heard of Professor Montgomery and dominance structur- ing, he or she knows how to wield these decision behav- iors. The agent might ask the client to note the positives of one apartment over the other, guiding the dominance structuring process along.

The agent will have a fifth to show, if the client insists, but the agent is hoping that the client will lock in on one that is “good enough.” The way not to be shepherded into a decision we might later regret is to decide beforehand that we will not let ourselves make any decision about the options, not even a tentative decision, until we have exam- ined each with equal scrutiny.

listen to Both sides first A variation on the pre- vious strategy is the mental discipline not to decide until we have heard the other side of the story. Judges instruct juries not to decide until after the prosecution and the defense have both com- pleted presenting their cases and made their closing argu- ments. Parents discover that it is not good enough to hear They know that they must hear the other child’s side of the story. We all have a natural tendency to believe the first credible report we hear and then use that belief to critique subsequent reports. Has this ever happened to you? Can you think of a time when you were involved in a situation or a disagreement with another person that resulted in that other person telling a third party what happened, only to find that when you tried to explain your side of the story to that third party they seemed to have already made up their minds about you? We as authors can think of a few examples with co-workers, friends, and even some family members where this has happened to us in the past. It takes a set of practiced critical thinking self-regulation skills and a strong habit of open-mindedness to resist coming to a premature decision regarding which side to believe.

Precautions When Testing

the Promising Option

use all the essential Criteria As obvious as this seems, we often do not use all the decision-critical criteria after identifying our promising option. We like the apart- ment in the complex that has the well-equipped workout

room, and so we elevate that new factor to the status of a major consideration. But our initial set of essential factors did not include that consider- ation. It may have been on our desirable list, but it was not on the essentials list. Instead, we err by neglecting one or more of our initially essential crite- ria, for example, the proximity to the university or the cost. Strong critical thinking hab- its of mind incline us toward sticking to our initial criteria and applying all of them to this candidate and to all the other candidates. If a new and important criterion emerges during the decision-making process, then we would want to revise the list of decision- critical criteria and initiate a new search. There may be others that have great rec- reational spaces. As we first envisioned our set of criteria, great recreational space wasnot among them. Until we saw this apartment, that consid- eration was not an essential factor. No matter whether we stick with our initial set of criteria or initiate a new search with a new set of criteria, the important thing is that we apply all of them if they are all considered essential.

treat equals as equals The tendency toward domi- nance structuring privileges the promising option over all the other candidates by orienting our thinking around whether that one option has any obvious disadvantages. If the favored option has no obvious disadvantages, then it will become the to-be-chosen option. I like the apartment in the complex with the great fitness room. So, I ask myself whether it has any major disadvantages as compared to the other choices. It’s pricey, but I can stretch. It isn’t as close to the university, but it’s not too far either. I wish the second bedroom were bigger, but I can live with that. Nope. No major disadvantages. Notice that in this process I did not give all four options a fair-minded evaluation, seriously comparing them on each criterion. Instead of truth-seeking, I threw objectivity to the wind and settled for an apartment that was more expensive, further from the university, and too small. And I did not even look at the other two criteria, safety and proximity to the Metro.

diligently engage in truth-seeking and remain imPartial Truth-seeking helps us follow reasons and evidence wherever they lead, even if they go against our preferred or favored option. This is an active process. We must discipline ourselves to go out and find the needed evidence and consider all the reasons, pro and con. Being diligent in truth-seeking means that we give fair- minded consideration to options and ideas even if they go against our preconceptions or cherished, but perhaps unreflectively held, beliefs. Impartiality helps us main- tain our objectivity. But we all know that it is hard to be impartial in some situations. If the stakes are high for us or if people we care about are involved, it is very diffi- cult. Strong critical thinking demands that we recognize contexts in which impartiality is difficult to maintain. In those cases, if others are involved, the judicious thing to decide is that someone else should decide. In legal mat- ters, when a potential juror is deemed to be at risk of not being impartial, that person is excused from being a juror. A judge who is at risk of not being impartial in a given case asks that the case be moved to a different judge. But in our daily lives, we cannot remove ourselves from judg- ing or excuse ourselves from the responsibility of making decisions. We must, instead, make a conscious and delib- erative effort to decide objectively. The habit of truth- seeking and the skill of self-regulation are irreplaceable assets in doing this.

Precautions When Fortifying

the To-Be-Chosen Option

Be honest With yourself The complex processes at work in the final stage of dominance structuring can be difficult to manage unless one is deeply committed to making honest evaluations. But, if there are good rea- sons, we can de-emphasize a given decision-critical crite- rion relative to another. In the apartment example, price may be more important than proximity to the campus. At other times, a criterion cannot be de-emphasized. Safety, for example, might have been a major consideration in the pre-editing phase. If that were the case, then it would be intellectually dishonest to argue at this point that it is no longer a factor to consider seriously. When bolstering we may be tempted to exaggerate the virtues of our to- be-chosen option and exaggerate the vices and shortcom- ings of the other options. But exaggeration would be less than fully honest. Yes, our favored candidate does have advantages, and yes, the other options have flaws, but we should use self-regulation to monitor our evaluation so that we do not blow these advantages or these flaws out of proportion.

Trading off one criterion for another can be straight- forward if the two have the same metric. For example, proximity to the university and proximity to the metro can both be measured in time and distance. So, we can more easily decide whether being a little closer to the metro and a little further from the university is acceptable or not. But when two criteria are measured on different met- rics, the trade-offs can be more difficult. How much safety should one trade to get a lower rent? How much smaller

can that second bedroom be to live closer to the univer- sity? Again, we need self-regulation skill to monitor and correct, if needed, our tendency to trade away too many importantthingstogetthatonefeaturethatattractsusso much. Collapsing criteria is not going to work when the criteria are as different as those in the apartment example. It is hard to imagine price and safety as one criterion. But in the hiring example earlier in the chapter, it could be rea- sonable to collapse work experience, volunteer experience, and maybe service-learning experience. If we can expect that the person learned job-relevant skills even though he or she may not have had a paying job, then collapsing makes sense.

Critical Thinking Strategies for Better

Decision Making

task indePendent teams With the same ProBlem Military commanders, realizing the risks of poor decisions, occasionally set two independent teams to work on the same problem. The theory behind this strategy is that if the two teams make the same recommendations, then that recommendation is probably the best option. If the teams make divergent or conflicting recommen- dations, then that provides the commanding officer the opportunity to listen impartially and objectively as each team explains why its recommendation is superior.

deCide When it’s time to deCide Particularly in group decision-making situations, there is a tendency to decide prematurely. Time for discussion is short, and some people always seem ready to decide faster than others do. People can become impatient, and the urgency of other matters can lead us into the trap of “Ready, Fire, Aim.” We can mitigate the ten- dency toward premature decision making by first setting out a plan for making the decision that identifies all the steps that will be taken first. In group decision making, this can be very helpful, for it establishes a set of expectations and assures time for the diligent inquiry and deliberation that is due an impor- tant decision. Obviously, it would be equally unwise to fail to make the decision when opportunities are being missed and the costs of delaying are mounting up. That said, sticking to an initial plan for when and how a decision needs to be made, including the time frame, fact finding, option development, and consultation, can be very helpful.

analyze indiCators and make midCourse CorreCtions Health care and business professionals employ this strategy. They frequently measure progress and make necessary adjustments if the relevant outcome indica- tors do not show the expected improvements. This strategy is the critical thinking skill of self-regulation made operational. When a patient is in the hospital, the clinicians monitor all the patient’s bodily systems to be sure that the treatment plan is having the desired effect. If any of the many tests that are performed show that the patient’s condition is not improv- ing, then the medical team makes changes in the patient’s

treatment. In business settings, people monitor sales revenues, expenses, cash flow, accounts payable, and accounts receiv- able on a regular basis. They review data to monitor progress toward revenue targets or to be sure they are staying within budget allocations. If any of the numbers look problematic, they make midcourse corrections. The same idea applies to decisions we make to improve or change our life situations. If we monitor the effects of those decisions and we do not see the results we planned, we need to make midcourse corrections.

Create a Culture of resPeCt for CritiCal thinking All of us, and leaders in particular, can increase the likelihood of better decision making by creating a cul- ture of respect for critical thinking. We do this by modeling and encouraging positive critical thinking habits of mind. We do this by inviting, acknowledging, and rewarding the con- structive use of critical thinking skills. We do this by showing respect for people even if they advance ideas and opinions that differ markedly from our own. We can model respect- ing people’s effort to think well even if we do not accept their ideas. As leaders we would be wise to invite people to sup- ply their reasons for their recommendations, rather than only their votes or their recommendations, as if the reasons were unimportant. As leaders we must give truth-seekers enough latitude to raise difficult questions without fear of reprisals. We must be willing to listen, to reconsider, and to be persuaded by good arguments. At the same time, we must use these same tools when presenting our final decisions—sharing not just the choice made, but providing the reasons for that choice.

What is dominant structuring?

What is dominance structuring in critical thinking?