Examining the Effect of Information Order on Expert Judgment
Abstract
Research indicates that humans use heuristics to make inferences and that, depending on task characteristics, these heuristics can lead to inconsistencies and errors in judgment-that is, cognitive biases. Most of this research has been performed with university students performing tasks, requiring logical thinking but not expertise in a particular substantive area. Our concern is in determining whether heuristics can lead to cognitive biases among experienced personnel performing their substantive task. In particular, we examined whether information order and response mode could affect the judgements of Army air defense operators. A within-subject factorial experiment was performed in December, 1989, with 63 Army air defense operators. Information order and response mode interacted to affect the Army air defense operators' judgments. When information was presented sequentially and a probability estimate was obtained after each piece of information, participants gave different probability estimates of whether an unknown aircraft was friendly or hostile, depending on the order with which the same information was presented. These results support the predictions of the Hogarth-Einhorn belief updating model.
Document Details
- Document Type
- Technical Report
- Publication Date
- Jun 01, 1991
- Accession Number
- ADA239708
Entities
People
- Leonard Adelman
- Martin A. Tolcott
- Terry A.. Bresnick