Hesitation and Herding
https://news.osu.edu/when-to-break-from-the-herd-to-make-a-better-decision/
In this article, Jeff Grabmeier describes an experiment performed by Ian Krajbich, which adds a psychological element to the herding experiment we discussed in class. Participants were presented with a bag of 3 balls each labeled A or B, and were told to guess whether the bag contained a majority of A or B balls. From this, if a participant saw a ball labeled A, they would be more likely to guess majority A, and vice versa. However, they can also see the guesses of other participants who went before them. This information can influence their decision, as seeing the two people in front of you guess majority B, and seeing your ball labeled A, would make you guess B. However, the study becomes more interesting when you factor in hesitation: if a participant hesitated before making their choice, and if the subsequent participant saw private information that conflicted with the herd, then they chose against the herd 2/3 of the time, and with the herd only 1/3 of the time.
In class, we only examined these situations with the assumptions that the only information people were able to gather and utilize were their private information and public guesses as to composition of the bag, and that the people in the situation were perfectly rational. However, this is not the case in real life. Not only is there so much more information people can gather that might influence their decisions, but some of that information can come from that lack of perfect irrationality: a perfectly rational person would not hesitate to make a decision as part of a cascade, but participants in this study hesitated, which was able to give later participants more information with which to make their decision.
These additional factors could explain some real world occurrences. People might be less likely to trust someone who is unsure, and more likely to trust someone who is extremely confident. This could be dangerous, but could also be helpful. As mentioned in the article, someone seeing that all of their friends are getting the COVID-19 vaccination might lead to them also being more willing to get vaccinated. However, not perfectly rational beings surrounded by hesitancy might begin to question reason.
I believe an important conclusion from this study is a distinction in the way that it is most effective to act in different contexts. In a purely scientific context, hesitancy is important, as the more you know about something the more you know you don’t know about it, and this sentiment might be shared by the other people you are communicating with. However, confidence is important along with reason in different contexts, when trying to influence decision-making. It is also important to understand that theoretical bases for phenomenon that we might discuss and prove in class are not always a perfect reflection of real human behavior.