#framing effect

Mental Shortcuts, Not Emotion, Guide Irrational Decisions

One theory is that framing is caused by emotion, perhaps because the prospect of accepting a guaranteed win feels good while accepting a guaranteed loss feels scary or bad. Another theory is that the Framing Effect results from a decision-making shortcut. It may be that a strategy of accepting sure gains and avoiding sure losses tends to work well, and adopting this blanket strategy saves us from having to spend time and mental effort fully reasoning through every single decision and all of its possibilities.

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¿Alguna vez te has preguntado por qué algunas decisiones parecen más razonables o atractivas dependiendo de cómo se presentan? ¿O por qué ciertas noticias o argumentos nos afectan más que otros, incluso si la información es la misma? La respuesta podría residir en un fenómeno psicológico conocido como el efecto marco, o the framing effect en inglés. ¿Qué es el Efecto marco? El efecto marco es…

Why are reporters and pundits insisting that a conviction of Trump in the election case rests on whether Trump knew he was lying or not? Are they idiots? Are they useful idiots? Or are they victims of the framing effect?

SUMMARY: In the media, we are hearing many reporters and pundits saying that the government will have a difficult time proving whether Trump knew he was lying or not. And, that the case against Trump depends on this determination. This idea is patently false, but it has become so prevalent that it seems like common sense now. Why would so many make such a fundamental error? The framing effect…

  Framing effect is a cognitive bias in which the brain makes decisions about information depending upon how the information is presented. Framing effect is often used in marketing to influence decision-makers and purchases. It takes advantage of the tendency for people to view the same information but respond to it in different ways, depending on whether a specific option is presented in a positive frame or in a negative frame. Marketers commonly use three types of frames to influence consumer decisions: 

The framing effect occurs when a person’s choice differs depending on how two logically equivalent statements are framed. This effect feeds one of the core ideas for many behavioural economists; that people behave irrationally. If we all acted according to rational economic theory, it wouldn’t matter how the choice was framed, we should all still make the same choice. Whether a doctor frames a statement as “Five years after surgery, 90% of patients are alive” or “Five years after surgery, 10% of patients are dead”,the number of people choosing to go ahead with it should not be affected, but it is. Significantly more people choose surgery after the “90% are alive” framing than the “10% are dead” framing.

According to Thaler and Sunsteinin Nudge,“Framing works because people tend to be somewhat mindless, passive decision makers” and so it offers a “brief glimpse a human fallibility”. Psychologist Gerd Gigerenzer, who is not of the belief that people are irrational creatures, reports in a fascinating new paper that this conclusion is unfair on humans, and instead suggests that this effect occurs due to the social intelligence of humans. He states that frames “leak” information to us and our social intelligence picks up on the implicit recommendation. By saying “90% of people survive”, the doctor is leaking information that it is the “survive” aspect that we should concentrate on, whereas by stating that “10% of people die”, the doctor is implicitly saying that it is the “die” aspect we should concentrate on, therefore implicitly recommending no surgery. This means that logically equivalent frames are not necessarily informationally equivalent.

Gerdbacks his argument by stating that when people are given the full information, “After surgery 90% of people survive and 10% die,” the framing effect disappears. The leaking of information has disappeared and therefore there are no subtle recommendation clues being given to the patient. In conclusion, he states that speakers rely on framing in order to implicitly convey relevant information and make recommendations that listeners pay attention to. In these situations, framing effects clearly do not demonstrate that people are “mindless passive decision makers”, but demonstrate the social intelligence of people being able to read between the lines and make intelligent decisions based on the information given.