Going with your gut leads to more personal decisions and some

At every turn, life confronts us to make a decision. We rarely solve such situations by consciously weighing the pros and cons. Instead, most of the time we trust our feelings – we go with our guts. According to a new study, decision-making based on feelings leads to more attitudes towards a given choice than to focus on logic. In addition, decisions based on intimate feelings are more personal, which can change a person's behavior, for better or for worse.

Researchers at Toronto and Yale Universities in Toronto designed four experiments totaling more than 450 participants. In each experiment, volunteers had to choose from a selection of similar items, such as different DVD players, cups, apartments or restaurants. We all know the fight.

Some participants were asked to make a deliberate and informed decision based on logic, while others had to make an intuitive and intuitive approach. After the fact, they had to answer a series of questions about their choice.

Members of the intestinal-based decision-making group were more likely to agree with statements that the decision reflected their true identity. They were also more certain of their decision and more likely to defend them.

For example, when asked to make their choice between two restaurants by sending the decision by email to their friends, people who intuitively chose a location were more likely to share the choice with more people.

"It suggests that focusing on feelings does not just change attitudes – it can also change behaviors," said principal investigator Sam Maglio, PhD, an associate professor of marketing at the University of Toronto in Scarborough.

But what was really surprising was the willingness of people to make a quick decision on the fly.

"So much popular wisdom says that we should avoid intuition, because careful deliberation is considered the surest way to good choices, but we can not escape our feelings," said Maglio.

"In making decisions, people have to decide not only what to choose, but also how to choose," he added. "Our research suggests that people who focus on their feelings when making decisions actually come to see the options chosen as more consistent with what is essential, true and unwavering about themselves.

Decision-making based on instinct is also surprisingly accurate. A previous study conducted by psychologists from Tel Aviv University revealed that participants were 90% accurate when asked to quickly choose the correct average value for the sequence of number pairs. Intuitively, the human brain has the capacity to absorb a lot of information and to determine an overall value, explain the researchers at the time.

However, Maglio says that intuitive decision-making is a double-edged sword. On one side, going with your gut can help people stay in important life choices, such as losing weight or studying for a new career because they have the impression of owning the choice. On the other hand, tripe-based decisions can lead to deep-rooted views – policy is a prime example.

"It's good to dig your heels, like making sure we get on the bike every day, that the pros and cons are minimal. But the heels dug give way to stubbornness and isolationism in the blink of an eye, "said Maglio. "When our political attitudes are intuitive and we are sure that we are right, we are depriving ourselves of the possibility that we may even be fooled. For this reason, frankness facilitated by deliberation may not be a bad thing. "

The results were reported in the review Emotion.

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