Thinking…

Five people are in a hospital. Each one has only one disease, and each has a different disease. Each one occupies a separate room; room 101 – 105. 1. The person with asthma is in room 101. 2. Ms Jones has a heart disease. 3. Ms Green is in room 105 4. Ms Smith has tuberculosis. 5. The woman with mononucleosis is in room 104. 6. Ms Thomas is in room 104. 7. One of the patients, other than Ms. Anderson, has a gall bladder disease. Question: What disease does Ms. Anderson have and in what room is she?

How do we solve problems?

• Algorithmomethodical, logical rule or procedure

that guarantees solving a particular problem

o Slower, but less error prone

• Heuristicso simple thinking strategy that often

allows us to make judgments and solve problems efficiently

o a mental shortcuto Speedy, but more likely to include errors

• Trial-and-Erroro involves trying a number of different

solutions and ruling out those that do not work. 

o hit or miss, may or may not be effective

• Insighto In some cases, the solution to a problem

can appear as a sudden insight.o  the underlying mental processes that

lead to insight happen outside of awareness.

What is the pattern? Why are these numbers

arranged this way?

8, 5, 4, 1, 7, 6, 3, 2, 0

Obstacles to problem solving

• Mental Seto tendency to approach a problem in a

particular way. Especially a way that has been successful in the past but may or may not be helpful in solving a new problem

• How would you arrange six matches to form four equilateral triangles?

• Try using pens/pencils with people around you.

• Using these materials, how would you mount the candle on a bulletin board?

• Thumbtacks• Candle• Box of matchsticks

Solution #1

Solution #2

• Functional Fixednesso tendency to think of things only in terms

of their usual functions

10 Twisted Ways of ThinkingBy THERESE J. BORCHARD at PsychCentral.com

All-or-Nothing Thinking- you look at things in absolute, black-

and- white categories

• Overgeneralization

o You view a negative event as a never-ending pattern of defeat

• Mental filter

o You dwell on the negatives and ignore the positives

• Discounting the positives

o You insist that your accomplishments or positive qualities don’t count

• Jumping to conclusions

o You conclude things are bad without any definite evidence. These include mind reading (assuming that people are reacting negatively to you) and fortune-telling (predicting that things will turn out badly).

• Magnification or Minimization

o You blow things way out of proportion or you shrink their importance.

• Emotional Reasoning

o You reason from how you feel.

• “Should” Statements

o You criticize yourself or other people with “shoulds,” “shouldn’ts,” “musts,” “oughts,” and “have-tos.”

• Labeling

o Instead of saying, “I made a mistake,” you tell yourself, “I’m a jerk!”

• Blame

o You blame yourself for something you weren’t entirely responsible for, or you blame other people and overlook ways that you contributed to a problem.