Maggie E. Toplak – författare

Cognitive Sophistication and the Development of Judgment and Decision-Making reviews the existing literature on the development of reasoning, judgment and decision-making, with a primary focus on measures from the heuristics and biases tradition. The book presents a model based on cognitive sophistication to examine the development of judgment and decision-making, including age related differences in developmental samples, associations with intellectual abilities and executive functions, and associations with dispositional tendencies that support judgment and decision-making. Additional sections cover the empirical findings of a longitudinal study conducted over seven years that tie together the discussed aspects related to cognitive sophistication.

This book will provide a much-needed description of the theoretical and conceptual issues, a review of empirical findings, and an integrative summary of the implications for developmental models of reasoning, judgment and decision-making.

How to assess critical aspects of cognitive functioning that are not measured by IQ tests: rational thinking skills.

Why are we surprised when smart people act foolishly? Smart people do foolish things all the time. Misjudgments and bad decisions by highly educated bankers and money managers, for example, brought us the financial crisis of 2008. Smart people do foolish things because intelligence is not the same as the capacity for rational thinking. The Rationality Quotient explains that these two traits, often (and incorrectly) thought of as one, refer to different cognitive functions. The standard IQ test, the authors argue, doesn''t measure any of the broad components of rationality—adaptive responding, good judgment, and good decision making.

The authors show that rational thinking, like intelligence, is a measurable cognitive competence. Drawing on theoretical work and empirical research from the last two decades, they present the first prototype for an assessment of rational thinking analogous to the IQ test: the CART (Comprehensive Assessment of Rational Thinking).

The authors describe the theoretical underpinnings of the CART, distinguishing the algorithmic mind from the reflective mind. They discuss the logic of the tasks used to measure cognitive biases, and they develop a unique typology of thinking errors. The Rationality Quotient explains the components of rational thought assessed by the CART, including probabilistic and scientific reasoning; the avoidance of “miserly” information processing; and the knowledge structures needed for rational thinking. Finally, the authors discuss studies of the CART and the social and practical implications of such a test. An appendix offers sample items from the test.

Children face an overwhelming amount of information and a range of different choices every day, and so there has never been a more important time to understand how children learn to make judgments and decisions in our modern world. Individual Differences in Judgment and Decision-Making presents cutting-edge developmental research to advance our knowledge and understanding of how these competencies emerge.

Focusing on the role of individual differences, the text provides a complementary theoretical approach to understanding the development of judgment and decision-making skills, and how and why these competencies vary within and between different periods of development. Sampling a diverse set of developmental paradigms and measures, as well as considering typical and atypically developing samples, this volume provokes thinking about how we can support our children and youth to help them make better choices.

Drawing on the expertise of a range of international contributors, this book will be of interest to students and researchers of thinking and reasoning from both cognitive and developmental psychology backgrounds.