decision making

A few weeks ago I went to training - hiring training - and a few of the comments there got me thinking about "gut feeling" and being a scientist. Or maybe more to the point, gut feeling and my basis of decision making (as a scientist). I would think that most of my training in grad school was "it doesn't matter what you think/feel but what the data tells you", aka "override gut feeling until you have data dots to prove it". That is; that gut feeling is fine, but you really need data to support it - otherwise it isn't "true" but "just a feeling" and that’s not valid until you can prove it.

Then when you interview people for a position, sometimes your gut goes "Hm, it doesn't feel all right here" ... and then my brain tells me to override the feeling until I find the reason (cause) of my feeling*. And after that I can make a decision. At the training though, many people did voice that gut feeling was the way to go, "after all, gut feeling tells you something that your brain might not recognize in words but transforming into a feeling" ... but unless I get the brain to tell me what it is, I am not comfortable with making a decision based on my feeling. Why? Probably because I think that if there is a valid feeling I would know what I based it on and therefore rule out the bias “I really like X so I’ll go with gut feeling on that and miss the data that tells me something else too”.

Like if I get results from an experiment and it doesn’t really look what I thought but gut tells me that there is something interesting there. What to do? Go and retry it and see if the result is the same yet again, if it is… data is data, right? (Hm) Or the experiment is not the right one?

Another thing that was pointed out to me during the training was "past behaviour predicts future behaviour". As in, you ask the interviewees about what they did at a certain time to know what they what they may (probably) do in the future. I understand the thinking but it goes against part of my beliefs that people can change and that what happened before might not be what happens in the future but sure…

In short, I left the training thinking a little too much about what to base my decisions on and if I trust my gut feeling or not. Especially since a few ones I’ve made in the past based on “gut feeling” turned out not the best ones, whereas most of the decisions based on “facts” and “data dots” (aka ‘list technique’) have turned out more favourable. Of course, I might only remember the bad gut feeling decisions (since they ended up fairly badly) and not take into account all the “regular happy ones” I’ve made – but I’m not too sure.

I’m revisiting this decision making basis again now because there are a few doors opening and I am going to have to make a few decisions in the near future. And it’s not as easy as saying choose yes or no for door B, then move over to door W and say aye or nay etc… No, rather it is “if you choose door B, door W will not be an option anymore” as in “it’s opting out of one thing when choosing the other”; and that leads me to have to weigh in a lot of other factors in my thinking and gut feeling is apparently one of them… If it would’ve been an experiment I would’ve made n=3 and see what the outcomes were and choose accordingly. However, I wonder if I should think of this round of choices as the last in a series or if it is an independent test altogether – no previous action will indicate the outcome…. Or just solving it all like the Gordian knot?

I know for sure that the option a friend of mine offered is a definite no though. After all; “just accidently close door W and then decide if you want the other doors” is not my style of things… even if it would be so much easier for this decision process … I guess I will know more in a few weeks… either or.



*I honestly think this would be one of the reasons I stayed through some harder things since I have decided that I don't care what I feel, I'll finish the task and then care about the "feeling" ... maybe I'm just too stubborn?