Illusion of Control - The Decision Lab: This book provides an in-depth exploration into the illusion of control, a cognitive bias that leads us to overestimate our own influence and be overly optimistic about our chances of success in uncertain situations. It provides a framework to increase decision-making accuracy and help to make smarter decisions. Key learnings include:
• Recognizing the illusion of control and understanding how it affects decision-making
• Analyzing biases to learn how they play out and how to cope with them
• Understanding the concept of Option Transitivity and the different ways to use it
As a UX designer, this book is a valuable resource to help hone decision-making skills. It offers insights into how to approach making tough decisions, understand biases, and think clearly about complex situations. Additionally, you may find these books also interesting for UX designers: Design Thinking for Strategic Innovation, Introducing User Experience Design, and The Design of Everyday Things.
🎀 Highlights
The illusion of control is one of many cognitive biases that throws a wrench into this idea.
button they could push to communicate that they wanted the noise to stop (although the experimenters made it clear that “we’d prefer that you do not”).
feeling like we do have some influence.
“The illusion of control” was coined by Ellen Langer, a Harvard psychologist.
chances of winning was influenced by a bunch of different factors—none of which actually had anything to do with their chances of winning.
People bet more money when they were cutting cards against someone who seemed awkward and unconfident,
People bet more money when they were cutting cards against someone who seemed awkward and unconfident, even though skill didn’t matter in this game; they
NPC group was more stressed out by the noise for a longer period of time, compared to the group that had the option of terminating the noise.
learned helplessness is a cornerstone of depression.4
Daniel Kahneman, one of the most influential figures in behavioral economics, talks about this tendency in his book, Thinking, Fast and Slow.
part of our mental health in general. The opposite of the illusion of control is learned helplessness, which describes how, if people have previously
The illusion of control is one of many cognitive biases that throws a wrench into this idea.
button they could push to communicate that they wanted the noise to stop (although the experimenters made it clear that “we’d prefer that you do not”).
feeling like we do have some influence.
“The illusion of control” was coined by Ellen Langer, a Harvard psychologist.
chances of winning was influenced by a bunch of different factors—none of which actually had anything to do with their chances of winning.
People bet more money when they were cutting cards against someone who seemed awkward and unconfident,
People bet more money when they were cutting cards against someone who seemed awkward and unconfident, even though skill didn’t matter in this game; they
NPC group was more stressed out by the noise for a longer period of time, compared to the group that had the option of terminating the noise.
learned helplessness is a cornerstone of depression.4
Daniel Kahneman, one of the most influential figures in behavioral economics, talks about this tendency in his book, Thinking, Fast and Slow.
part of our mental health in general. The opposite of the illusion of control is learned helplessness, which describes how, if people have previously
The illusion of control is one of many cognitive biases that throws a wrench into this idea.
button they could push to communicate that they wanted the noise to stop (although the experimenters made it clear that “we’d prefer that you do not”).
feeling like we do have some influence.
“The illusion of control” was coined by Ellen Langer, a Harvard psychologist.
chances of winning was influenced by a bunch of different factors—none of which actually had anything to do with their chances of winning.
People bet more money when they were cutting cards against someone who seemed awkward and unconfident,
People bet more money when they were cutting cards against someone who seemed awkward and unconfident, even though skill didn’t matter in this game; they
NPC group was more stressed out by the noise for a longer period of time, compared to the group that had the option of terminating the noise.
Autonomy
learned helplessness is a cornerstone of depression.4
Daniel Kahneman, one of the most influential figures in behavioral economics, talks about this tendency in his book, Thinking, Fast and Slow.
part of our mental health in general. The opposite of the illusion of control is learned helplessness, which describes how, if people have previously
