This class is aimed at making you a better decision maker. The course is organized around an important distinction between descriptive, normative and prescriptive concerns in decision making. The primary focus is on descriptive questions (e.g., how do we make judgments about the world and how do we make decisions based on these judgments). In asking these questions, we are concerned with how individuals think about decision making and how they act based on these thoughts. The short answer, to be developed much more completely in this course, is that although people form judgments and make decisions in a systematic fashion, their decisions are not always as optimal as possible. But optimal as measured against what? Much of our class will contrast the “do” (or descriptive emphasis) with the “should” (or normative emphasis). Normative questions deal with how should we behave if we wish to behave rationally. We discuss and identify principles of rationality, or principles which most reasonable people would like to have govern their behavior. Prescriptive questions deal with how can we improve our decision making. The prescriptive approach will reflect the descriptive realities of human decision making with an eye toward acting normatively. In this class, we develop a framework for improving your abilities to: (i) generate excellent alternatives and choose the best among these alternatives; (ii) understand and form judgments about the critical uncertainties governing your decision problem; and (iii) understand the objectives — the reason you care about particular outcomes.
