Question

Nutz and Boltz, Inc., employs one hundred people; eighty are lawyers and twenty are engineers. Albert, a lawyer at the company, is quiet, likes puzzles, and carries a calculator. Most people, when asked whether Albert is a lawyer or an engineer, will guess that he is an engineer. These people are using __________ to make this faulty guess. A correct guess would have been made if they had used __________.

Answer 1

Answer:

These people are using the representativeness heuristic to make this faulty guess. A correct guess would have been made if they had used base rate information.

Step-by-step explanation:

Representativeness heuristic occurs when the similarity of items or events causes individuals to be perplexed about the likelihood of a given result. People usually make the error of guessing that two comparable things or occurrences are more closely related than they are. Therefore, the similarity of an engineer and a calculator confuse the people to guess that Albert is an engineer.

Base rate information refers to the information provided by base rates which are a type of statistic that is used to describe the percentage of a population that exhibits a certain feature. Base rates suggest the likelihood of something based on the lack of other facts. Using the information in the question as an example, if 20% of the employees were engineers and 80% were lawyers, the base rate of lawyers is simply 80%. This implies that Albert is a lawyer, but we won't know for sure until we look at the total number of workers that the base rate information reveals that he is a lawyer.

Therefore, these people are using the representativeness heuristic to make this faulty guess. A correct guess would have been made if they had used base rate information.