Decision Science News

MASTERS IN COGNITIVE AND DECISION SCIENCES

Decision Science News is based out of London. And you could be, too.

University College London and Birkbeck are launching a new MSc in Cognitive and Decision Sciences (to start in Sept 2007).

This program studies the cognitive processes underlying human thought and decision making. Key topics include: probabilistic models of the mind; the nature of computational explanation; the general principles of cognition; the scope of rational choice models; learning and memory; applications to economics and business.

It draws on an outstanding faculty at UCL and Birkbeck, including internationally renowned researchers in psychology, computational modelling, neuroscience and economics. It also takes full advantage of London’s unique position as a global “hot-spot” for research in cognition, decision-making, and neuroscience, with a high density of research seminars and scientific meetings.

The course is suitable for students from a wide range of disciplines, including psychology, economics, neuroscience, philosophy, computer science and statistics.

Further information is available at: http://www.psychol.ucl.ac.uk/courses/msc/MScCoDeS.html

For informal enquiries contact David Lagnado (d.lagnado at ucl.ac.uk), Nick Chater (n.chater at ucl.ac.uk) or Marius Usher (m.usher at psychology.bbk.ac.uk)

Please forward this to any students who might be interested in applying.

See also: http://www.ucl.ac.uk/news/news-articles/0612/06122102

COGNITIVE AND NEURO EXPERTISE SOUGHT

When Decision Science News was born, it was born at Columbia’s Center
for the Decision Sciences. Now CDS is hiring again.

Columbia University’s Center for the Decision Sciences anticipates
hiring a postdoctoral research scientist for a period of up to three
years, with a starting date of August 2007. The main responsibility will
be to carry out research related to cognition and memory with an
emphasis on decision making and the construction of preferences across
the lifespan, under the supervision of Professors Eric Johnson, Elke
Weber, and Yaakov Stern. This position is open to candidates with
behavioral research experience, data analysis and modeling skills, and
training in cognitive psychology or a related discipline, who have
recently earned their PhD or who are expecting their doctorate in 2007,
on a topic relevant to the psychology of decision making broadly
defined. Training in neuropsychology as well as neuroscience and fMRI
research would be particularly valuable skills. Additionally experience
with health- and cognitive function screening of older adults and
experience with on-line research would also be a plus.

The Center for the Decision Sciences at Columbia University is directed
by Professors Eric Johnson, David Krantz, and Elke Weber and includes
researchers from psychology, marketing, management, medicine, law and
beyond. Please visit our website for more information:
http://decisionsciences.columbia.edu

To apply, please send a CV, two letters of recommendation, reprints of
published papers, and a cover letter describing your research interests.
In your cover letter, please describe your research expertises, data
analysis and modeling skills, neuropsychological and neuroscience
skills, and computer skills (including any experience with online
research).

Review of applications will start April 15 and continue until the
position is filled.

Electronic applications (all parts as attachments to a single email)
should be submitted to:

Ryan O. Murphy, Ph.D.
Research Scientist and Associate Director
Center for the Decision Sciences
rom2102 at columbia dot edu

Columbia University is an Affirmative Action, Equal Opportunity Employer.

SMDM 2007 PITTSBURGH OCTOBER 20-24, 2007

The 29th Annual Meeting of the Society for Medical Decision Making will take place October 20-24, 2007 in the Sheraton Station Square Hotel in Pittsburgh, PA, USA. This year’s meeting will focus on exploring the science of decisions and consumer-driven, individualized health care.

Visit www.smdm.org to learn more about these key dates:

February 1, 2007 Hotel Reservation Opens
March 2, 2007 Abstract Submission Site Opens
June 13, 2007 Meeting Registration Opens
October 20-24, 2007 SMDM Annual Meeting

Call for Short Courses: SMDM is now accepting proposals for Short Courses for the 2007 Annual Meeting. Submission form is available at www.smdm.org.
Deadline for submission: March 5, 2007

Call for Nominations for the 2007 SMDM Awards: SMDM Awards Program is designed to recognize distinguished service to SMDM and/or the medical decision making field. Visit www.smdm.org for detailed descriptions of awards, past recipients, and eligibility requirements. Deadline for award nominations: April 1, 2007

Call for Abstracts: Submit your original work for presentation at the 2007 Annual Meeting in Oral and Poster format. Electronic submission site and detailed instructions will be available starting March 2 at www.smdm.org.
Deadline for abstract submission: June 8, 2007

Photo credit: http://www.flickr.com/photos/imcgraw/320300997/

POSTDOC IN SOCIAL AND ORGANIZATIONAL BEHAVIOR AT STANFORD

The Graduate School of Business at Stanford University anticipates appointing a Postdoctoral Fellow in Social and Organizational Behavior for a period of one to two years, with a starting date of September 2007. The Postdoctoral Fellow will serve as Co-director of the Behavioral Laboratory along with another Postdoctoral Fellow and will coordinate several ongoing research projects. The position will not require any teaching. Salary will be competitive. Hiring is contingent upon budgetary approval.

Stanford has a growing community of researchers who explore basic and applied problems at the social psychological level of analysis. There is a colloquium series as well as several doctoral level seminars in which a Postdoctoral Fellow could participate. We will select an applicant who plans to work collaboratively on research with one or more of the psychologically oriented faculty members in the organizational behavior program (Francis Flynn, Deborah Gruenfeld, Chip Heath, Roderick Kramer, Brian Lowery, Joanne Martin, Dale Miller, Margaret Neale, Jeffrey Pfeffer, Charles O’Reilly, Elizabeth Mullen, and Larissa Tiedens) and/or in the marketing program (Jennifer Aaker, Baba Shiv, Itamar Simonson, and Christian Wheeler). The Stanford GSB Web page (https://gsbapps.stanford.edu/facultybios/) provides some detail about research interests.

This position is open to candidates who have recently earned their PhD degree, or who are expecting their PhD in 2007, in any area of psychology, organizational behavior, or marketing. Familiarity with methods of experimentation at the social psychological level of analysis is important. In particular, experience in conducting computer, web-based, and interpersonal interaction-based experiments is a plus.

Applicants should submit a curriculum vitae, two letters of recommendation, and a cover letter describing their research interests and accomplishments to Brian Lowery, 518 Memorial Way, Stanford University, Stanford, CA 94305. In addition, they should indicate one or two faculty members with whom they would be most interested in working. Applications are welcome immediately, and they should be received by February 28, 2007 to receive full consideration. Additionally, curriculum vitae should be submitted online to the SU Jobs website. To submit online, please visit our website: http://jobs.stanford.edu/find_a_job.html and use the following requisition number: 23536; click on “apply” at bottom of page, highlight the requisition number, and copy and paste (or upload) your resume and submit.

Questions concerning the position can be addressed by electronic mail to Brian Lowery at Lowery_Brian at gsb dot stanford dot edu

Stanford University is an Equal Opportunity Employer.

NEURAL SYSTEMS OF SOCIAL BEHAVIOR CONFERENCE, AUSTIN, 11-13 MAY 2007

The the Neural Systems of Social Behavior conference will take place in Austin, TX, May 11-13th. The schedule is available and registration is now open.

Information on registration, hotel, and transportation can be found here

Online registration is now open and will remain open until all spaces are filled. Registration and payment of fees can be carried out through the PayPal on the website. Space is limited.

Information on the schedule can be found at:
http://mindbrain.ucdavis.edu/content/Labs/Beer/Conference-Schedules

Photo credit: http://www.flickr.com/photo_zoom.gne?id=348668447&size=m

ASSOCIATION FOR CONSUMER RESEARCH (ACR) CONFERENCE MEMPHIS: OCT 25-28, 2007

The 2007 North American Conference of the Association for Consumer Research will be held at the elegantly refurbished Peabody Hotel in Memphis, Tennessee, from Thursday October 25 through Sunday October 28, 2007. As in past years, the conference will provide a forum for scholarly presentations, discussions, and collaborations on consumer behavior.

There will be six main forums for the presentation and discussion of research and scholarly thought. In addition to the five tracks to which submissions are sought, this year’s conference will feature a new forum called “Epistemic Sessions.”

1) Competitive Paper Sessions include papers that represent the completed work of their authors. The ACR conference co-chairs assign accepted papers to Conference sessions that reflect similar scholarly interests.

2) Symposia (previously titled “special sessions”) provide opportunities for focused attention on cutting-edge and important areas of research. Successful sessions feature research that crosses theoretical, methodological or substantive boundaries but offer a coherent perspective in building bridges across emerging substantive, theoretical, or methodological issues.

3) Working Paper Track: Participants typically present preliminary findings from the early stages of a research program. Authors distribute their papers and display their findings poster-style in a plenary session.

4) Roundtables: Encourage intensive participant discussions of consumer research topics, as well as disseminations of professional and technical skills.

5) Film Festival: Presents edited video recordings on topics related to consumer behavior.

6) Epistemic Sessions: The goal of the epistemic sessions is to provide a forum for researchers within a given theoretical paradigm to raise, debate and resolve contentious theoretical and methodological issues pertinent to their paradigm. While the featured speakers will be invited by session chairs, your input on issues for discussion will be sought closer to the date of the conference via a web discussion board.

Submission and Decision Deadlines

Submissions for competitive papers, symposia, working papers and roundtables must be received no later than Friday March 23, 2007. Notification of acceptance in these four categories will be made by Friday July 27, 2007. The entry deadline for Film Festival submissions is Friday April 13, 2007. Notification of accepted films will be June 1, 2007.

A detailed document announcing additional conference highlights and a call for submission are now available on the conference website: http://www.acrweb.org/acr (Click on link Call for Submissions in the left panel). It will also soon be made available on the main ACR website: http://www.acrwebsite.org/

CONFERENCE CO-CHAIRS
Angela Lee (Northwestern University)
Dilip Soman (University of Toronto)

SUBJECTIVE PROBABILITY, UTILITY AND DECISION MAKING CONFERENCE

The bi-annual SPUDM Conference run by the European Association of Decision Making will take place in Warsaw, Poland between 19th and 23rd August 2007.

Researchers and students interested in any in any area of decision making or in a related field are invited to participate in the SPUDM 21.

The SPUDM Conferences have a long history and one of the earliest meetings – SPUDM 6 was held in Warsaw. After thirty years SPUDM is coming back to Poland.

The organizers of the upcoming meeting are dedicated to continuing the long tradition of SPUDM conferences status as the primary venue for exchanging novel ideas in psychological and economic decision-making and attracting the new generation of researchers to the field. To this end, we have succeeded in inviting a group of the most distinguished researchers from both Europe and the United States to be keynote speakers or to participate in the panel discussion. The opening lecture will be given by Professor Daniel Kahneman. The keynote speakers are: John W. Payne, Alex Kacelnik and Tadeusz Tyszka.

Submissions of paper abstracts, poster abstracts, and proposals for workshops are invited on any topic in basic and applied judgment and decision making research.

Deadline for all submissions is March 1, 2007.

For more information http://www.spudm21.org

Decision Science News will be covering SPUDM 2007 in all (subjective) probability.

RESEARCH SCIENTIST POSTDOC AT THE UNIVERSITY OF CHICAGO

The University of Chicago Graduate School of Business, Center for Decision Research anticipates hiring a Postdoctoral Fellow for a period of one to two years, with a starting date of July 2007. The Postdoctoral Fellow will serve as research scientist funded by a grant from the Templeton Foundation, and will both work on research projects with faculty funded by the grant and manage the content for an online data collection and demonstration website for the Center (web programming skills are desirable, but not necessary).

The Center for Decision Research at University of Chicago includes a group of researchers interested in the study of judgment and decision making, social psychology, marketing, organizational behavior, and behavioral and experimental economics (Nicholas Epley, Ayelet Fishbach, Linda Ginzel, Reid Hastie, Chistopher Hsee, Aparna Labroo, Ann McGill, Tanya Menon, Suresh Ramanathan, Richard Thaler, Bernd Wittenbrink, and George Wu). The group runs weekly workshop and brownbag seminars. More information on the group and our activities is available at: www.chicagocdr.org.

Preference will be given to candidates with expertise and interest in working with a faculty member sponsored by the grant in one of the following research areas, broadly defined: Nicholas Epley: mind-reading, perspective-taking, and social coordination Ayelet Fishbach: self-control and goal-pursuit Reid Hastie: group decision-making, improving decision-making among the elderly Christopher Hsee: the measurement, meaning, and determinants of happiness Tanya Menon: the influence of culture on social cognition and the creation of personal values Richard Thaler: behavioral economics, and how to increase personal savings rates George Wu: goal pursuit and the impact of goals on happiness and satisfaction

This position is open to candidates who have recently earned their Ph.D., or who are expecting their degree in 2006, in any area of psychology, organizational behavior, or marketing. Expertise in behavioral decision-making research and related areas in social and cognitive psychology is preferred to manage the content of the demonstration and data collection website. Web programming skills are helpful, but not necessary. We anticipate that managing the decision research website will be a half-time job, at most.

Applicants should submit a curriculum vitae, two letters of recommendation, and a cover letter describing their research interests. Applicants may also wish to detail experience relevant to the lab manager duties. Selection will be based largely on the applicant’s ability to work collaboratively on research with one or more of the Center for Decision Research faculty members. The applicant should indicate one or two faculty members with whom they would be most interested in working. Review of applications will begin on March 15, 2007 and will continue until the position is filled. Applications should be sent to:Nicholas Epley, Graduate School of Business, University of Chicago, 5807 S. Woodlawn Avenue, Chicago, IL 60637, epley at gsb dot uchicago dot edu, (773) 834-1266

Applicants are encouraged to apply via electronic mail. Questions concerning the position can be addressed by electronic mail to Nicholas Epley. The University of Chicago is an Affirmative Action, Equal Opportunity Employer.

A CHANGE OF WEIGHT REVEALS NEWTON’S FLAW

Interestingly, Newton’s enumerated solution to Pepys’ problem is correct (see previous DSN entry), but the logic is wrong, as Statistician Stephen Stigler points out.

The problem is now solved by with bionomial distribution: the probability of A is the greatest. For those who speak R, the probabilities are

Probability of Event A = sum(dbinom(1:6,6,1/6)) = 0.67
Probability of Event B = sum(dbinom(2:12,12,1/6)) = 0.62
Probability of Event C = sum(dbinom(3:18,18,1/6)) = 0.60

This was Newton’s logic:

“If the question be thus stated, it appears by an easy computation that the expectation of A is greater than that of B or C; that is, the task of A is the easiest. And the reason is because A has all the chances of sixes on his dyes for his expectation, but B and C have not all the chances on theirs. For when B throws a single six or C but one or two sixes, they miss of their expectations.”

But Stigler points out Newton’s logic doesn’t hold if we use loaded dice, in which the probability of a six is not 1/6 but 1/4.

Probability of Event A’ = sum(dbinom(1:6,6,1/4)) = 0.82
Probability of Event B’ = sum(dbinom(2:12,12,1/4)) = 0.84
Probability of Event C’ = sum(dbinom(3:18,18,1/4))= 0.86

Mathemagically, the probabilities grow from A to C in this case.

For a fun and short read, check out:

Stigler, Stephen M. (2006). Isaac Newton as a Probabilist. Statistical Science, 21(3), 400-403. [Download]
Photo credit: http://www.flickr.com/photos/awshots/352212946/

QUESTION FROM A LETTER TO NEWTON

In 1693, Samuel Pepys wrote Isaac Newton a letter asking for help solving a probability problem:

Which is most probable?

A. Six fair dice are tossed independently and at least one “6” appears.
B. Twelve fair dice are tossed independently and at least two “6”s appear.
C. Eighteen fair dice are tossed independently and at least three “6”s appear.

Standing on the shoulders of giants, it is not as hard today as it was in the 17th century, but take a shot at solving it.

Watch the next post of Decision Science News for the answer and reference to a paper that addresses it.