| Much research has demonstrated that people are subject to numerous errors and biases in many of their judgments. One of the methods researchers have investigated to help decision makers reduce these errors is called a decision rule: a specific formula or rule for combining information. Although decision rules are the "best" possible means of arriving at the judgment, research has shown that they are often neglected, resulting in poorer performance. In order to test whether decision-rule utilization could be increased, two experiments were conducted in which subjects made judgments with or without the aid of a decision rule. In both experiments, two variables were factorially manipulated: (a) the reported accuracy of the rule and (b) instructions to search for reasons why one's judgment without the rule might not be adequate.;The results from both experiments revealed that subjects did utilize the decision rule to some extent when it was available. The manipulations, however, were significant only in Experiment 1 with the reasons search manipulation being significant only for those subjects with low expertise in the area. This suggests that decision-rule utilization can be increased though it depends somewhat on the nature of the task, the way the manipulation is stated, and the expertise of the decision maker. Theoretical accounts for these findings as well as suggestions for future research were discussed. |
