Article archive / December 1, 2016
Originally published: . Volume 7, No. 12. Source pages: 2.
Making Decisions by J. Nelson
In the late 70s Archimedes and I decided it was about time to get married. Even though the 60s were in the rearview mirror, we were non- traditionalists at heart, and I, being almost done with my doctoral training, was perfectly happy living in what my dad called, “dignified poverty.”
So we invited the entire LSU psychology department, family and friends, to a pot-luck wedding reception. My dress cost $55.00, my parents paid for liquor and Archimedes paid for the band and hall at the old Bellemont on Airline––he actually had a real job.
We were living in his small house in blue-collar, North Baton Rouge, not far from chemical plants and the department of highways. The mortgage was $76 per month.
Archimedes made a daily trip to the local Hi Nabor grocery, where he’d load up on plate lunch specials from the deli, served by a genuine Cajun woman whose accent was so heavy I could barely understand her. But Archimedes did, because he and Cajun Lady spoke the language of food. She loved to feed him and he loved to eat. (If the house were burning down at lunchtime, he’d let it burn to the ground rather than miss his meal.)
So when Cajun Lady discovered we were getting married she enthusiastically explained that she owned a cake decorating business and made the finest wedding cakes available, and at a great price.
Archimedes said “Sure,” because he liked easy solutions to domestic problems and I said “Sure,” because I liked Archimedes. And, didn’t the French know this stuff––a la Julia Child?
So I was surprised when, on the day of our wedding activities I was met by my typically cheerful, calm sister, Suzannah, who was, in a word, frantic.
“There’s a problem with the cake,” she said in an urgent, hushed, and desperate voice.
“What’s the matter?”
“Come with me,” she rasped out. “Maybe we can cut it up into pieces before more people get here.”
She ushered me over to one of the long tables arranged around the perimeter of the hall. There sat a circus monstrosity, decorated with icing of sunflower yellow and fire engine red. It leaned to the side, as if it lacked the motivation to stand up straight. The top layer of the cake had been put on a separate plate, because it kept sliding off, Suzi said, laying the whole catastrophe at our feet and waiting for instructions.
After a short pause, Archimedes began to laugh uproariously. Then I began to laugh. My sister sighed and shook her head.
We have several judgment errors here. Our cake designer was over- confident, a common human trait. In a study of nearly 15,000 judgments, when people were 98 percent sure of something (and this did not include motivated reasoning), they were right only 68 percent of the time.
Eighty percent of high school students judge themselves to be in the top half of the population in any measure of talent. If a person is in the lowest quartile, they routinely judge themselves to be in at least the 60th percentile, and this group even ignores feedback that contradicts their self-inflated views. We PhDs are no better, in fact, we’re worse. Ninety-four percent of us think we are in the top half of all others in our profession.
Poor decisions are usually a group failure. Archimedes and I were guilty of groupthink, of conformity bias, of social loafing, and any variety of elements of motivated reasoning, just as a start.
It was only a cake. Important, serious decisions are made every day in our state by board members, lawmakers, council members, politicians, individuals, organizations––all in the pea soup of flawed human judgment and poor group process. We’re not much better than dart-throwing chimpanzees at figuring out the future, or at solving its complex problems. Psychology has a lot to offer in the dilemmas of human self-deception and problem-solving.
Our wedding cake wasn’t the worst decision I ever made––I have a list of whoppers. It wasn’t even important. But the Cajun Lady was right when she told us she’d make us a cake that we’d never forget.
This article is part of a historical newspaper archive. Read the original issue for its original layout, photographs and graphics.