Conditions of Uncertainty and Risk

Decision Making Under Uncertainty and Risk

Most people make choices out of habit or tradition, which is usually fine. However, certain situations can cause decision-making to go wrong:

/

  • Social pressure or time constraints hinder careful consideration.

  • Emotional state influences decisions.

  • Lack of information or skills leads to suboptimal decisions.

  • People often don't fully consider the probabilities of consequences, relying more on personal experience even when statistics are available.

Comparing courses of action can be challenging, leading to reliance on habitual responses. The information processing capacity of a decision-maker can be strained. Unknown factors and the reactions of other people further complicate decision-making.

The Role of Information

In an ideal scenario, we'd have complete information for rational decisions. However, uncertainty is common due to a lack of or unavailable information. More information generally leads to better decisions, but decision-makers often face a severe lack of it.

Conditions for Decision Making

Depending on the amount of knowledge available, there are three conditions for decision-making under uncertainty:

  1. Decision making under pure uncertainty: No knowledge about the likelihood of outcomes.

  2. Decision making under conditions of risk: Varying degrees of information are available.

  3. Decision making by buying expert judgment: Reduce uncertainty by acquiring information.

This creates a continuum:

  • Ignorance: No information about the situation or outcomes.

  • Risky decision making: Some information is available, and risks are considered.

  • Complete knowledge: All necessary information is known.

Pure Uncertainty

The decision-maker has absolutely no knowledge, not even about the likelihood of occurrence of any possible outcome. Decisions are based purely on attitude (optimism, pessimism) or minimizing regret.

Sources of Errors

Errors arise due to:

  • False assumptions about the situation and outcomes

  • Inaccurate estimation of probabilities

  • Difficulties in measuring preferences

  • Incorrect forecasting

Child Protection Context

A practitioner needs some knowledge to predict probabilities for reasonable and defensible decisions. This suggests most child protection decision-making occurs under varying degrees of uncertainty and risk, requiring practitioners to acknowledge this.

Risk

Risk implies uncertainty and an inability to fully control outcomes. Risk or its elimination is inherent in child protection. Barry Mason suggests focusing on "safe uncertainty."

Eliminating one risk can increase others. For example, a young person leaving an abusive relationship becomes homeless and vulnerable to modern slavery.

Effective risk handling requires assessment and consideration of its impact on the decision process. The decision process allows evaluation of alternative strategies prior to a decision. Decisions are guided by the likelihood, severity, imminence, and frequency of any future behavioral risk and decision matrices can be also used.

Decision Making Under Risk

Decision-makers may increase information by:

  • Collecting more data

  • Consulting more people

  • Monitoring and surveillance

  • Seeking expert judgement

Uncertainty and difficult practice contexts can lead to paralysis in decision-making. Hostility between families and agencies can impact practitioners' understanding and risk assessment.

Factors Influencing Decision Making

Thomas and Holland suggest four groups of factors:

  • Case factors

  • Organizational factors

  • External factors

  • Decision-maker factors

Improving Decision Making

Given the difficulties in child protection due to uncertainty and risk, various tools and techniques can improve the decision-making process. Understanding how decisions are made under uncertainty and risk is an important first step. The second is having tools to aid decision making and the third is knowing the strengths and limitations of the tools and strategies that you use.

Defensible decision-making combines:

  1. Understanding decision-making under uncertainty and risk.

  2. Using tools to aid decision-making.

  3. Knowing the strengths and limitations of these tools.

These points align with the Ministry of Justice's multi-agency public protection arrangements (MAPPA).

Conclusion

While 100% certainty is unlikely, acknowledging limitations and improving knowledge can move towards a position of safe uncertainty.