© cranfield university thinking: how we do it & can we do better? professor karen carr...

© Cranfield University

Thinking:How we do it

& can we do better?

Professor Karen Carr

Cranfield Defence and Security


What is Thinking?


Observe

Orient

Decide

Act

Detect / Collect

Recognise / Structure / Understand

Identify / Prioritise / Select

Apply / ConfirmDirect


Information (in real world or representation of world)

Non-targets Non-targets + Target

RESPONSE

“Nota Target”

CorrectRejection

Miss–TYPE II error–False negative

“Target” False Alarm–TYPE I error–False positive

Hit

‘Target’ examples:• Intent• Person• Solution• Pattern


Observe

Orient

Decide

Act

Detect / Collect

Recognise / Structure / Understand

Identify / Prioritise / Select

Apply / ConfirmDirect


Some Implications

• You cannot increase your probability of being right without also increasing your probability of being wrong

• To improve performance you must change the characteristics of the ‘processor’ (your thinking)

• Understanding thinking and practicing it helps you do this


Exercise – Thinking Awareness

• You will be presented with some problems to think about

• Can you identify what kind of thinking you are using for each problem?

• NB These exercises are used to help you think about your thinking – getting the answer right is not so important!


Keeping these 6 circles, move one circle only to make an L-shape with 4 circles on each arm of the L.


Lessons

• ASSUMPTIONS• Importance of exploring the problem

definition before the solution• Use of analysis and insight

© Cranfield University Insight Test 4

The objects below have something in common:

Which one of the following three objects is the next element in the row?


Lessons

• Seeing with different perspectives• ‘Letting go’• Creativity vs. analysis


Intelligence

• What kind?• How much? Bird

ChimpHuman


Multiple Intelligences

7 “Frames of Mind”: – Linguistic– Logical-mathematical– Musical– Bodily-kinaesthetic– Visuo-spatial– Interpersonal– Intrapersonal

• PLUS?: Naturalistic, Existential

Howard Gardner, 1983


Effortful

Automatic

Conscious ThinkingAnalysisReason

Non-conscious ThinkingIntuition

Experience

Deliberate

Explicit

Systematic

Tacit

Holistic

Primary

Fast


Cognitive Styles

Allinson and Hayes (1996) The Cognitive Style Index


IntuitionHenri Poincaré, Foundations of Science, 1908

One morning, walking on the bluff, the idea came to me that the arithmetic transformations of indeterminate ternary quadratic forms were identical to those of non-Euclidean geometry.”

(Poincaré, quoted in Hadamard, 1945, pp. 13–14).

“I turned my attention to the study of some arithmetical questions apparently without much success ............I went to spend a few days at the seaside, and thought of something else.


Exercise

• Please refer to hand-out

• We shall not ask for your answers to be attributed


Prediction

Yellow Group > White Group


Anchor Point Effect(Source: Kopelman & Davis, 2004)

A series of trials conducted over 13 years revealed an average of

High estimates 45%> Low Estimates.


Would you like to buy?

Iyengar and Lepper


10 x more likely to buy


Framing Effect

Same information – presented differentlyYou can both mislead and be misled

“25% fail”

“Problems if you don’t” “No problems if you do”

“75% pass”

Allow natural death Do not resuscitate


Metaphors as Framing

“Crime is a beast”

Enforcement

“Crime is a virus”

Systemic reform

Initial metaphor not remembered


Storytelling

“Strategic leaders create a drama that resonates with members”

(Boal et al. p.421)• Leader role in creating meaning, shaping reality,

developing a sense of self in others, developing and distributing ideas, encouraging behaviours, stimulating connectivity, developing expectations.

• Use of ‘stories’ to do this.

BOAL, K.B. & SCHULZ, P.L. (2007), ‘Storytelling, time and evolution: The role of strategic leadership in complex adaptive systems’ The Leadership Quarterly, 19, 411-428.


Heuristics and Biases

• ‘Hard-wired’ thinking that we are born with• This type of thinking evolved to help us function

efficiently in our natural environment• It biases us to respond quickly, be social, keep

mental resources free for the unexpected

(See Annexes in JDN 3/11)


Thinking and Emotion

• Brain biased by emotions • Advantageous for social

and interpersonal behaviour

• Decision making depends on emotions (Antonio Damasio)

http://faculty.txwes.edu/mskerr/files/3304_ch2.htm


“Intuition”: Good or Bad?


Non-Conscious Intelligence

1. Short-cuts, rules of thumb, quick solutions that have evolved in context - “hard-wired”

2. Creativity, learning, dealing with complexity and ambiguity, making use of experience – slow to build, fast to extract


Developing Creativity

1. Preparation

2. Incubation

3. Illumination

4. Verification


• Lots of stimulation - connections

• Do the unusual – swap hands, change environment, speak to different types of people

• Gestures (enact metaphors)

• Analogy –stretch it• Role play• Individual thinking and

pairs

Immersionhttp://w

ww

.scubadivingpackages.net/tag/packages/


Incubation

• Do something else• Sleep• Go for a walk• Don’t think


Illumination

• Early rise• Deadline• Ritual, signal• Bin the good ideas (don’t get attached)


Implement and verify

• Rational sifting• Watch out for heuristics• Context effects


What we have learned

• Non-conscious intelligence• Good for creativity• Good for complexity• Good for collating experience and using

it fast• Prone to heuristics and bias


Ways of Thinking

Two fundamental functions:

Consciously OR non-consciously

DIVERGENT:

Constructing, expanding, exploring

CONVERGENT:

Deconstructing, reducing, selecting


• The grass is wet……therefore……

• The lights are out….therefore….

• The car is too expensive…..therefore….

• The telephone is ringing….therefore….


Exercise

From the statement below, what deductions can you converge upon – eliminate all assumptions, extract the basic fact(s). You can take the statement to be true as given(!).

“A red car was travelling above the speed limit on a country road.”


Applied Knowledge?

• Assumptions– Which limit, which road, where was the car travelling?– Weather, time of day (not expect speeding on snow?)– Travelling (on its own, on a lorry, etc)

• Images– Type of car– Traffic (associations with country?)– Occupants? (Associations with red car and speeding)


Lessons

• ASSUMPTIONS • Inferences• Implicit sense-making• Effects of experience and knowledge


Some other creativity techniques

• Embodied metaphors (paths, boxes)• Lateral thinking (e.g. concept fan,

random word)• Visualisation (thought experiments)• Avoid obstacles:

o “Not my area”oNeed for closure, controloFear of failureoBeing judgemental


Asymmetry in creative thinking

Value ‘lateral move’ - not finding solution

De Bono


Concept Fan “Put object on ceiling”

Object to ceiling

Raise me off the ground

Lengthen arm

Self propel

Piggy back on anotherobject

Stick

Rope

Throw

Sticky ceiling

Sticky object

Spikey

Lower ceiling

Model aircraft

Fix object to ceiling


DIVERGENTWAYS

CONVERGENTWAYS

Conscious brain

Non-consciousbrain

Thinking: Ways and Means

Inductive reasoningHypothesis generationLateral thinking

Creative thinkingIntuitive developmentAnalogy

Intuitive decision makingInsight“Thin slicing”Expert judgement

AnalysisDeduction“Slow thinking”


A ‘convergent thinker’ sees a limited, predetermined number of options.

By contrast, a ‘divergent thinke’r is always looking for more options.

Many of us get stuck in convergent thinking and, as a result, don’t see the many possibilities available to us.


Clear Analytical Thinking

• Practice makes perfect• Techniques can be mastered• Few people have studied logic


How to ask a question

• Why might Jane Smith have omitted to do a risk assessment?

a) She forgot

b) She was under time pressure

c) She thought it was unimportant

Divergent becomes convergent – which type of thinking do you want?


Ontology Problem

Eggs

Flour

Milk

Recipe

Bowl

Whisk

Oven


Ontology Problem

Training Equipment

Personnel

Information

Doctrine

Organisation

Infrastructure

Logistics

Independent? Subordinate?

Which common properties?


Defence Security


Given:

All terrorists are extremists, and some extremists are killers.

Therefore which follows:• Some terrorists are killers• Some killers are terrorists


Extremists

Terrorists

Killers

We don’t know where ‘Terrorist’ or ‘Killer’ are with respect to the blue circle

All terrorists are extremists

Some extremists are killers

Some terrorists are killers?

Some killers are terrorists?


Lessons

• Clarity with conceptual thinking needs practice

• Asking the right question depends on conceptual clarity

• Finding the right answer depends on asking the right question


Need for Thinking

Thinking Capability

Adapting Thinking to the Situation

SITUATION – MORE COMPLEX THINKING- MORE AGILE


DIVERGENTWAYS

CONVERGENTWAYS

Conscious brain

Non-consciousbrain

Thinking: Ways and Means

Less Time

More Information

More TimeMore People

More ambiguity

Experience

OrganisedSocial

Rules


Observe

Orient

Decide

Act


Skilled Thinking

• Use all types of intelligence• Be aware of innate and cultural biases• Recognise you are making assumptions• Clarity and discipline with concepts• Understand the situation and adapt your

thinking• Practice cognitive management


Exercise – Diagnose Your Thinking


Bramble Town

8000 Residents Home of R.L. Headlington Winner of Britain in Bloom

Bramble Arts Festival: 1st – 6th August 2014


Police Community Support Officers

Powers:– Issuing of fixed penalty notices (e.g. riding

on footpath; dog fouling; litter) – Power to confiscate alcohol and tobacco – Power to demand the name and address of

a person acting in an anti-social manner – Power of entry to save life or prevent damage – Removal of abandoned vehicles– For example; reporting vandalism or damaged

street furniture, reporting suspicious activity; providing crime prevention advice, deterring juvenile nuisance and visiting victims of crime.


DIVERGENTWAYS

CONVERGENTWAYS

Co

nscio

us

thin

king

No

n-c

on

scio

us

thin

kin

g

START: What assumptions are embedded in the formulation of the problem/situation?Does anything need to be challenged in the problem given?

• Are you exploring the problem first?• Have you introduced different perspectives?• Don’t get attached – put good ideas to one side and move onto get even better ideas

• Are you closing down too soon ? (Don’t converge until you need to)• Have you identified assumptions?

• Can you take time out – or at least focus elsewhere and then return to the issue?• Stimulate more brain parts by using different techniques

MID-WAY: Step back and review what you should be doing and what you are doing - have you characterised the problem and the phases of problem

solving?Are you using different ways of thinking - appropriately?

• Watch for confirmation bias, framing, anchoring, availability• Where can experience and knowledge help, and where might it mislead?


Confirmation bias: see what you expect or wish for, pay more attention to evidence supporting this, discount evidence against

Framing: influenced by the manner of presenting or articulating the information

Anchoring: judgement inadvertently recalibrated by the presence of other information even if irrelevant

Availability: judgement inadvertently skewed towards factors that are more familiar

© cranfield university thinking: how we do it & can we do better? professor karen carr...

Documents

cranfield university

cranfield university

analysis slide

insight slide

direct slide

security slide

attributed slide

cognitive style index