Falling Into The Trap Of Conjunction Fallacy
Perception is the major reason behind people falling into the trap of conjunction fallacy. People caught in conjunction fallacy find it easier to conceive two events occurring together than them happening separately. To be more precise a conjunction fallacy occurs when two events which can occur together or alone are seen more likely to happen in combination than isolation. This usually happens when it is easier to imagine two events occurring in a combination than occurring alone. It is a formal fallacy that occurs when it is supposed that certain given specific conditions based on our perception are more likely to happen than a single general one.
The realization of fallacies in cases is often difficult because arguments are often structured …show more content…
in rhetorical patterns that hinder the establishment of logical connections between statements. Mostly this is achieved by exploiting the emotional, intellectual, or psychological weaknesses of the audience.
To have the competence to identify fallacy in statements is a way through which the chance of the occurrence of the conjunction fallacy can be brought down to the minimum level.
Amos Tversky and Daniel Kahneman have presented the example of Linda problem to propound this theory and make it more comprehensible to people.
In the Linda problem experiment the subjects were given details about an imaginary girl Linda.
“Linda is 31 years old, single, outspoken, and very bright.
She majored in philosophy. As a student, she was deeply concerned with issues of discrimination and social justice, and also participated in anti-nuclear demonstrations.”
Then they were asked that which condition was more probable?
1. Linda is a bank teller.
2. Linda is a bank teller and is active in the feminist movement.
The majority of the audience settled for the option no. two. However, speaking in the terms of probability, the probability of two events occurring together (in "conjunction") is always less than or equal to the probability of any one of them happening independently.
For example, if we choose a very low value for probability of Linda being a bank teller, say Pr(Linda is a bank teller) = 0.03 and a high probability of her being a feminist, say Pr(Linda is a feminist) = 0.97, then, assuming independence, Pr(Linda being bank teller and Linda being a feminist) = 0.03 × 0.97 or 0.0291, which is lower than the probability of her being only a bank teller. Which violates the laws of probability, Tversky and Kahneman explains that this happens mainly because subjects tend to add an unstated implication to the effect that the other answer implied that Linda’s not being a …show more content…
feminist.
They further argue that people use a heuristic (an easily calculated procedure) called representativeness to reach to this kind of judgment: Because the option two seems more "representative" of Linda based on the description provided, even if it can be found out that the chosen option is clearly less likely to happen.
Although there are criticism of this theory by Gerd Gigerenzer and Ralph Hertwig saying that the Linda problem is wording and framing. And even if several methods have been developed to minimize the possible misinterpretation but none of them has dissipated the effect. And the theory has stood the test of times.
Stephen J. Gould has praised the example of Linda problem by saying that he is particularly fond of this because he knows that the [conjoint] statement is least probable, yet a little homunculus in my head continues to jump up and down, shouting at me—“but she can’t just be a bank teller; read the
description.”
A vital part of the human learning process includes perception. A learner try to get meaning through the cues and meaning gathered from the environment, process the assembled message, and operate based on this process. Managerial processes involving interpersonal communications follows the perceptive model of learning.
But often in the absence of time, energy, or other resources, people often take the short method to get and process information; which brings significant negative effects on understandings, and this tendency is not excluded from the organizational context. These perceptual shortcuts results in biasing the outcomes and have potentially serious and far-reaching implications for organizations. Perception may affect the selecting of employees, the quality of workplace interaction among employees. However, these effects can be brought down to minimal level by applying the improvisational theater game (ITG) workshop design, particularly an effective method of arts-based experiential learning, which allow its participants to keep their perceptual shortcuts aside, overcome biases and practice their second next chance behaviors to expand their managerial skills.
Individuals use all the knowledge they have to make the “right” decisions, but the knowledge each person uses to interpret objects and events is a function of prior experiences, mental structures, and beliefs happen to dominate more his thinking process. When a subject, the perceiver categorizes the perceived information and then infers something about the perceived based on experiences in the past; perceptual shortcuts occur. The arrival on such judgments is instantaneous without paying much heed to objective information. Perceptual shortcuts may function as heuristic cues in social information processing and lessening a person’s data processing load. This reduction effect can be especially useful to managers due to the limited human capacity for processing information.
The realization of fallacies in cases is often difficult because arguments are often structured …show more content…
in rhetorical patterns that hinder the establishment of logical connections between statements. Mostly this is achieved by exploiting the emotional, intellectual, or psychological weaknesses of the audience.
To have the competence to identify fallacy in statements is a way through which the chance of the occurrence of the conjunction fallacy can be brought down to the minimum level.
Amos Tversky and Daniel Kahneman have presented the example of Linda problem to propound this theory and make it more comprehensible to people.
In the Linda problem experiment the subjects were given details about an imaginary girl Linda.
“Linda is 31 years old, single, outspoken, and very bright.
She majored in philosophy. As a student, she was deeply concerned with issues of discrimination and social justice, and also participated in anti-nuclear demonstrations.”
Then they were asked that which condition was more probable?
1. Linda is a bank teller.
2. Linda is a bank teller and is active in the feminist movement.
The majority of the audience settled for the option no. two. However, speaking in the terms of probability, the probability of two events occurring together (in "conjunction") is always less than or equal to the probability of any one of them happening independently.
For example, if we choose a very low value for probability of Linda being a bank teller, say Pr(Linda is a bank teller) = 0.03 and a high probability of her being a feminist, say Pr(Linda is a feminist) = 0.97, then, assuming independence, Pr(Linda being bank teller and Linda being a feminist) = 0.03 × 0.97 or 0.0291, which is lower than the probability of her being only a bank teller. Which violates the laws of probability, Tversky and Kahneman explains that this happens mainly because subjects tend to add an unstated implication to the effect that the other answer implied that Linda’s not being a …show more content…
feminist.
They further argue that people use a heuristic (an easily calculated procedure) called representativeness to reach to this kind of judgment: Because the option two seems more "representative" of Linda based on the description provided, even if it can be found out that the chosen option is clearly less likely to happen.
Although there are criticism of this theory by Gerd Gigerenzer and Ralph Hertwig saying that the Linda problem is wording and framing. And even if several methods have been developed to minimize the possible misinterpretation but none of them has dissipated the effect. And the theory has stood the test of times.
Stephen J. Gould has praised the example of Linda problem by saying that he is particularly fond of this because he knows that the [conjoint] statement is least probable, yet a little homunculus in my head continues to jump up and down, shouting at me—“but she can’t just be a bank teller; read the
description.”
A vital part of the human learning process includes perception. A learner try to get meaning through the cues and meaning gathered from the environment, process the assembled message, and operate based on this process. Managerial processes involving interpersonal communications follows the perceptive model of learning.
But often in the absence of time, energy, or other resources, people often take the short method to get and process information; which brings significant negative effects on understandings, and this tendency is not excluded from the organizational context. These perceptual shortcuts results in biasing the outcomes and have potentially serious and far-reaching implications for organizations. Perception may affect the selecting of employees, the quality of workplace interaction among employees. However, these effects can be brought down to minimal level by applying the improvisational theater game (ITG) workshop design, particularly an effective method of arts-based experiential learning, which allow its participants to keep their perceptual shortcuts aside, overcome biases and practice their second next chance behaviors to expand their managerial skills.
Individuals use all the knowledge they have to make the “right” decisions, but the knowledge each person uses to interpret objects and events is a function of prior experiences, mental structures, and beliefs happen to dominate more his thinking process. When a subject, the perceiver categorizes the perceived information and then infers something about the perceived based on experiences in the past; perceptual shortcuts occur. The arrival on such judgments is instantaneous without paying much heed to objective information. Perceptual shortcuts may function as heuristic cues in social information processing and lessening a person’s data processing load. This reduction effect can be especially useful to managers due to the limited human capacity for processing information.