The Influence of Visualization on Intuitive and Analytical Information Processing

Abstract

To test the assumption in cognitive-experiential self-theory (CEST) that visualized experience is similar to real experience in people's intuitive-experiential system but not in their analytical-rational system, participants responded to a verbal description of the ratio-bias (RB) game of chance with and without vivid visualization of the situation. In real situations, people have consistently been willing to pay small sums of money for the privilege of drawing from a bowl that offered 10 winning items out of 100 in preference to one that offered 1 winning item out of 10. Some reported that although they “knew better,” they “felt” they had a better chance of drawing a winning item when there were more of them. Interestingly, this irrational response does not occur when people are simply asked what they believe they would do in a real situation. In support of prediction, vivid visualization of a verbal description of the game of chance reproduced the phenomenon that otherwise occurs only in real situations. Several subsidiary predictions based on CEST were also supported, including the biasing effect of intuitive-experiential thinking on subsequent attempts to think rationally. This effect, which has been demonstrated in several other situations, has important implications for understanding human irrationality.