Decision making – The Conversation

Uniquely colored flowers with big blooms might make for an aesthetically pleasing garden, but they can be unhelpful to pollinators. Careful consideration can help you plan a colorful and eco-friendly garden.

People use cognitive shortcuts to make choices that sometimes have outcomes that don’t serve their own interests or preferences. But to call these choices irrational might be missing the big picture.

The World Cup’s VAR controversies reveal a broader challenge for AI-assisted decision-making: deciding what AI should handle, what it should support and what should be left to human judgment.

The typical advice is to take a break and come back to the problem tomorrow with a fresh start.

Expertise comes with training, experience and accreditation. And expert consensus is the best guide modern democracies have for making decisions about complicated challenges.

Understanding how employees rationalize questionable decisions can help leaders create more ethical workplace cultures.

Effective decision-makers balance competing priorities and options while staying deeply aware of the needs of their stakeholders, from employees and colleagues to customers and investors.

Cutting back on small indulgences can have a lasting impact on social connections and local economies.

Black Friday is a psychological event, carefully designed to take advantage of how your brain makes decisions. But you can stay one step ahead this sales season.

Context, perceptions and expectations affect the choices both bees and people make.

Do you dry your hair before going out to avoid catching a cold? That’s even if you know viruses are the real cause? Here’s what’s going on.

Speaking a second language doesn’t impact moral decisions as much as previously thought.

Across a series of studies, researchers dug into what really triggered FOMO – and what worked to fend it off.

What’s for dinner? That’s a tough decision to make, especially when you’re hungry, tired or overwhelmed with options.

Our brains know we’ll change our minds before we do. Understanding how might help us learn to make better decisions.

No one wants to spend their hard-earned money on a dud product, so we’ll seek advice from strangers. Online reviews can help – but often lead us down the wrong path.

Knowing how many calories a food contains has become a familiar part of eating. But it may muddy rather than clarify a person’s understanding of how healthy that food is.

Hunger is setting in for Alone Australia contestants. Here’s what’s going on in the body and the mind.

And how you can use psychology to help you break out of the habits you want to lose.