Judgment in decision making and evidence-based management (JUDMEM)
Contents
While today’s companies and individuals have access to more and more data, most decisions are taken on limited and imperfect information. Consequently, various fields require their practitioners to have an in-depth understanding of judgment and decision-making. Examples include the development of user interfaces and marketing strategies, hiring decisions, crisis intervention, as well as policy-making in education, healthcare, or social services. This course examines how people make choices, judge situations, probabilities, and decision options. The focus is on the contrast between rational decision-making, and the psychological principles that guide decision behavior. The course reviews common heuristics, cognitive errors and systematic biases that help us to make reasonable and accurate decisions in some areas, but may crucially misguide us in others. We will develop tools to detect and mitigate systematic cognitive biases and we will identify strategies that tap into these insights for improved decision-making in diverse real-world contexts, both in simple everyday-life situations and complex managerial decision environments.
Students are able to
- describe key psychological processes involved in judgment and decision making.
- explain when and why those processes lead to (more or less) accurate and inaccurate judgments.
- identify and describe common judgment and decision heuristics and biases.
- apply the acquired knowledge to examples and problems from business and public policy.
- explain the methodology (experiments and field studies) used to study judgment and decision making and apply it to new real-world applications.
- work together in international small work groups, summarize key takeaways from behavioral studies, and present their results in English.
| Recommended prerequisites | None |
| Time and room | tbd |
| Integration in curriculum | 2nd or 4th semester |
| Module compatibility | Master International Information Systems (from 2018/19 + 2016/17): Elective in the section Digital Business (a request for recognition as core course in the module Digital Business has been filed) Master Wirtschaftsingenieurwesen: Allgemeines Wahlmodul |
| Method of examination | Written examination, group presentation, and class participation |
| Grading procedure | Written examination (60%), project (40%) |
| Module frequency | Winter term (irregularly) |
| Workload | Contact hours: 30 h Independent study: 120 h |
| Module duration | 1 semester |
| Teaching and examination language | English |
| (Recommended) reading | All relevant material will be provided during the seminar. |