Thinking Fast and Slow - Daniel Kahneman ***

For reasons I can’t remember, I didn’t read this pop psychology title at the time of its 2011 publication. (I was really surprised it was that recent - in my mind it was about 20 years old.) Had I done so, I would have loved it. I used to hoover up these books describing all the ways our brains mislead us (even though I found it difficult to remember the vast swathes of different effects and the many biases that were being described). And there’s still a lot to enjoy here. But…

It’s impossible now to read a book like this that is based on a whole host of small and/or poorly sampled experiments without being all too aware of the replication crisis. For example, Kahneman’s chapter on priming has been described as a 'train wreck', based as it is on a set of experiments that have almost all been discredited.

Not only does this concern apply where you happen to know these details, it prompts (surely a psychological effect that Kahneman would be able to write about) suspicion when presented with some findings where I don’t know how good the trial was.

For example, we’re told of an example where participants were presented with two lists of characteristics, three good, three bad. These were applied to two 'people', one with the good attributes listed first, the other leading with the bad ones. Apparently, because of the halo effect, when the good ones were closer to the name, people thought the person was better. But surely this would also apply if people assumed the common convention of putting more significant attributes earlier in a list? There's a reason that questionnaires shuffle up the order of choices when be asked to pick out a few - early ones are given priority. But it's nothing to do with closeness in layout to the thing being considered. You could put the name at the end, after the list of attributes and still get the same effect.

This is an entertaining read of its kind, though, as is often case with a book looking at psychological biases, it covers too many and after a while they get absorbed into a mental mush. But the replication crisis demands a 'start again from scratch, please' rating. I'd be interested to see a new edition taking this into account.

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Review by Brian Clegg - See all Brian's online articles or subscribe to a weekly email free hereShort

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