Systems, Processes, and Types of Thinking

Why are some people good, and some people bad, at making decisions? Each of us can sometimes meet normative expectations and sometimes we cannot. A popular solution to this puzzle is to claim that we have two decision-making processes. One is analytic and the other, more imperfect, is emotional. In this chapter we look at some of the evidence in favour of this idea and contrast it with a single utility-based model. The evidence includes situations in which the two processes are in conflict or involve moral judgement. We conclude with a discussion of how we should view human rationality.