From the Nobel Prize-winning author of Thinking, Fast and Slow and
the coauthor of Nudge, a revolutionary exploration of why people make
bad judgments and how to make better ones--"a tour de force" (New York
Times).
Imagine that two doctors in the same city give different diagnoses to
identical patients--or that two judges in the same courthouse give
markedly different sentences to people who have committed the same
crime. Suppose that different interviewers at the same firm make
different decisions about indistinguishable job applicants--or that when
a company is handling customer complaints, the resolution depends on who
happens to answer the phone. Now imagine that the same doctor, the same
judge, the same interviewer, or the same customer service agent makes
different decisions depending on whether it is morning or afternoon, or
Monday rather than Wednesday. These are examples of noise: variability
in judgments that should be identical.
In Noise, Daniel Kahneman, Olivier Sibony, and Cass R. Sunstein show
the detrimental effects of noise in many fields, including medicine,
law, economic forecasting, forensic science, bail, child protection,
strategy, performance reviews, and personnel selection. Wherever there
is judgment, there is noise. Yet, most of the time, individuals and
organizations alike are unaware of it. They neglect noise. With a few
simple remedies, people can reduce both noise and bias, and so make far
better decisions.
Packed with original ideas, and offering the same kinds of
research-based insights that made Thinking, Fast and Slow and Nudge
groundbreaking New York Times bestsellers, Noise explains how and
why humans are so susceptible to noise in judgment--and what we can do
about it.
