It’s a simple idea but, as was true in medicine for so long, it is routinely overlooked. For example, the CIA gives its analysts a manual written by Richards Heuer, a former analyst, that lays out relevant insights from psychology, including biases that can trip up an analyst’s thinking. It’s fine work. And it makes sense that giving analysts a basic grasp of psychology will help them avoid cognitive traps and thus help produce better judgments. But does it? No one knows. It has never been tested. Some analysts think the training is so intuitively compelling that it doesn’t need to be tested.
...more
