Thinking Fast, Thinking Slow

Dual process theory

1. fast automatic thinking

2. slow deliberate thinking

System 1, system 2

System 1: automatic, intuitive, no effort

System 2: deliberate, effortful, requires mental work and concentration

Atler and Oppenheimer, 2007

A: how font affects thinking

P: 40 Princeton students/cognitive reflections test/3 questions/measures whether people use fast thinking to answer and get it wrong or slow thinking and get it right/half were given CRT in easy to read font and half were given in difficult to read font

F: students given CRT in easy font had only 10% success rate for all three questions/students given CRT in difficult font had 65% success rate

C: difficult to read font causes participants to slow down and engage in system 2 thinking, resulting in answering the question correctly/easy to read font causes participants to use system 1 thinking creating incorrect answers

Evaluate Atler and Oppenheimer, 2007

• Supports dual processing theory

• Only Princeton undergrad students: low generalisability

• CRT is trick questions: low ecological validity