Unit 7

Sociology
Decisions, Decisions
Sensory Perception
In this unit, you will:
• read about two different approaches to decision-making.
• evaluate generalizations.
• learn about uses of analogies.
• increase your understanding of the target academic words for
this unit:
adapt deduce hypothesis mode respond
conform enforce implicate nonetheless statistic
consent exclude imply option thesis
 Self-Assessment of Target Words
• Read the target words of this unit in the objectives box above. Think
carefully about how well you know each word. Then, write each word in
the appropriate column in this chart. When you have finished this unit,
come back and reassess your knowledge of the target words.

I have never I have seen I understand I have tried I use the I use the
seen the the word but the word to use the word with word with
word before I am not sure when I see or word, but I confidence in confidence
what it hear it in a am not sure I either both in
means sentence am using it speaking or speaking and
correctly writing writing
Reading 1:
Before You Read
Read these questions. Discuss your answers in small groups.
1. When you are treated for an illness or injury, do you feel
more comfortable if the medical doctor quickly determines
what you are suffering from or if the doctor takes a long
time?
Reading 1:
Before You Read
Read these questions. Discuss your answers in small groups.
2. Some decisions are made quickly. Some are more deliberate.
Examine the items below and decide whether a quick decision or
long deliberation is better.
• making a move in a game like chess
• electing a leader of a club or organization
• choosing a movie to see
• deciding whether to trust a stranger
• deciding to accept a job
• deciding what clothing to buy
• deciding whether someone is guilty of a crime
• choosing a college or university
Reading 1: Read
Blink
• In this excerpt from Malcolm Gladwell's Blink: The Power of
Thinking Without Thinking, the author discusses research into
the validity of hunches.
Reading 1: Read
Blink
In front of you are four decks of cards-two of them
red and the other two blue. Each card in those four
decks either wins you a sum of money or costs you
some money, and your job is to turn over cards from
any of the decks, one at a time, in such a way that
maximizes your winnings.
Reading 1: Read
Blink
The Iowa scientists found that gamblers started
generating stress responses to the red decks by the
tenth card, forty cards before they were able to say
that they had a hunch about what was wrong
with those two decks.

Stress
Reading 1: Read
Blink
The Iowa experiment implies that our brain uses two very
different strategies to make sense of the situation.
•The first is the one we are most familiar with. It's the
conscious strategy. We think about what we have learned,
and eventually we come up with an answer.
•The second operates below the surface of consciousness .The
part of our brain that leaps to conclusions like this is called the
adaptive unconscious (a hunch).
Reading 1: Read
Blink
What do we tell our children?
•Haste makes waste.
•Look before you leap.
•Stop and think.
•Don't judge a book by its cover.
We really only trust conscious decision-making. But there are
moments, particularly in times of stress,
•when haste does not make waste,
•when our snap judgments and first impressions can offer
a much better means of making sense of the world.
Decisions made very quickly can be every bit as good as
decisions made cautiously and deliberately.
After You Read
Reading Comprehension Activities
A. Mark each sentence as T (true) or F (false) according to the information in
reading 1. Use dictionary to help you understand new words .
........ 1. In the experiment with the red and blue decks of cards, most people had
some idea of what was happening after fifty cards .
........ 2. People became suspicious of the red deck of cards even before they could
explain why.
........ 3. According to the reading, the unconscious brain works more slowly than
the conscious brain .
........ 4. Most people make all of their decisions in either one mode or the other,
not both .
........ 5. The decision to jump out of the way of a moving truck is probably an
unconscious one .
........ 6. The sayings in the last paragraph of the article all urge people to think
carefully before making a decision .
........ 7. The reading suggests that we underestimate the value of snap judgments.
........ 8. Our brains do not work well when information is limited.
After You Read
Reading Comprehension Activities

A. Answer Key:
After You Read
Reading Comprehension Activities
B. Scan the reading to find the sentences paraphrased below. In
the blank, write the first few words of the original sentence.
1. The majority of subjects began to suspect something after
they'd played about fifty cards.
2. So far there were no surprises.
3. We reflect on what we know and in time we reach a
conclusion.
4. But it has a disadvantage in that it initially takes place beyond
the reaches of conscious thought.
5. It is like a huge microprocessor that silently and efficiently
collects and analyzes a lot of necessary information.
After You Read
Reading Comprehension Activities

B. Answer Key:
READING STRATEGY: Evaluating
Generalizations
READING STRATEGY: Evaluating
Generalizations
Malcolm Gladwell uses these generalizations to support his
conclusion that we should place more trust in first
impressions.
• Write T for those statements that describe something that is
true for all people
• Write S for those that illustrate a statistical tendency.
• Write N if you're not sure .
READING STRATEGY: Evaluating
Generalizations

Answer Key:
After You Read
Vocabulary Activities
After You Read
Vocabulary Activities
A. Read the paragraph about "thin-slicing." Fill in the blanks
with a target word from the chart above that completes the
sentence in a grammatical and meaningful way. Be sure to
use the correct form.
A. Answer Key:
After You Read
Vocabulary Activities
After You Read
Vocabulary Activities
B. Using your powers of deductive reasoning, complete the
sentence with a prediction that would have to be true if the
hypothesis is true.
l. Hypothesis: Emotions originate in the heart.
This claim implies that people with artificial hearts will lacke
motions.
After You Read
Vocabulary Activities

B. Answer Key:
After You Read
Vocabulary Activities
C. Your prediction may be deducible, but can it be tested? Design an
experiment or test for one of your predictions in activity B. Explain your
test to the class.

D. In colleges and universities, students have required courses and

electives, or optional courses.
• Examine this list of college courses. Write R for the courses you feel
should be required for all students and 0 for those that should be
optional.
Reading 2:
Before You Read
Here is a list of decisions similar to the ones you examined before
you read Blink. This time, ask yourself if you would be more likely to
trust a decision made by a single expert or a consensus reached by
a larger group of people. Discuss your ideas in a small group.
• making a move in a game like chess
• choosing a movie to see
• choosing a restaurant to dine at
• deciding what clothing to buy
• choosing a college or university
• electing the leader of a club or organization
• choosing a leader to solve a temporary problem
• predicting what team will win a championship
• deciding whether someone is guilty of a crime
Reading 2: Read
The Wisdom of Crowds
• This excerpt from The Wisdom of
Crowds, by James Surowiecki,
discusses the benefits of collective
thinking.
Reading 2: Read
The Wisdom of Crowds
• Galton was a man obsessed with two things: the
measurement of physical and mental qualities, and breeding.
• His experiments left him with little faith in the 20 intelligence
of the average person, "the stupidity and wrong-headedness
of many men and women being so great as to be scarcely
credible.“
• Francis Galton stumbled on a simple, but powerful, truth:
under the right circumstances, groups are remarkably
intelligent, and are often smarter than the smartest people in
them.
Reading 2: Read
The Wisdom of Crowds
• One of the striking things about the wisdom of crowds is that even
though its effects are all around us, it's easy to miss, and, even
when it's seen, it can be hard to accept.
• We assume that the key to solving problems or making good
decisions is finding that one right person who will have the answer.
• An intelligent group figures out how to use mechanisms -like
market prices, or intelligent voting systems-to produce collective
judgments that represent not what any one person in the group
thinks but rather, in some sense, what they all think.
• Paradoxically, the best way for a group to be smart is for each
person in it to think and act as independently as possible.
After You Read
Reading Comprehension Activities
Mark each sentence as T(true) or F(false) according to the information in
Reading 2. Use the dictionary to help you understand new words .
........ 1. The reading suggests that Francis Galton contributed to the field of
statistical measurement .
........ 2. Galton's original hypothesis about the intelligence of people was
confirmed .
........ 3. James Surowiecki has reached a different conclusion about crowds
from that of Charles Mackay.
........ 4. The best decisions are always made by people who are expert in a
field .
........ 5. Surowiecki says groups are vulnerable to bad decision-making when
there are rules that maintain order and focus .
........ 6. Surowiecki warns that group conformity can lead to poor judgments .
........ 7. This article tends to support the validity of democratic forms of
government.
After You Read
Reading Comprehension Activities
• Mark each sentence as T(true) or F(false) according to the
information in Reading 2. Use the dictionary to help you
understand new words .

Answer Key:
READING STRATEGY: Understanding
Analogies
READING STRATEGY: Understanding
Analogies
READING STRATEGY: Understanding
Analogies
• Several readings in this book use analogies. Reread these
selections and mark them with an I if the analogy is used to
illustrate a difficult concept, or A if the analogy is used to
argue a point.
A. Answer Key:
After You Read
Vocabulary Activities
After You Read
Vocabulary Activities
A. Read this brief article on prediction markets. Fill in the
blanks with a target word from the table that completes the
sentence in a grammatical and meaningful way. Be sure to
use the correct form.
In The Wisdom of Crowds,]ames Surowiccki praises a method
for predicting the future called "predictions markets."
Prediction markets allow individuals to buy contracts with
either real money or play money to predict the outcome of
events. Participants can wager, for example, on who will win a
presidential election. If the "market" thinks that one
candidate is likely to win, the bids for the contract are higher.
After You Read
Vocabulary Activities
A. Read this brief article on prediction markets. Fill in the
blanks with a target word from the table that completes the
sentence in a grammatical and meaningful way. Be sure to
use the correct form.
A. Answer Key:
After You Read
Vocabulary Activities
After You Read
Vocabulary Activities
B. Rewrite these sentences using a form of implicate or imply.
Compare work with a partner.
1. The mayor was involved in a scheme that misused public
funds.
2. What might result from the city's plan to expand the airport?
3. He objected to a suggestion in the article that he caused the
city's financial crisis.
4. Corrupt building inspectors were partially to blame for the
building's collapse.
5. The report insinuates that the city council is not working hard
enough.
After You Read
Vocabulary Activities
B. Rewrite these sentences using a form of implicate or imply.
Compare work with a partner.
B. Answer Key:
After You Read
Vocabulary Activities
C. A thesis is the technical term for the main idea that an essay
or article is trying to explain or support.
A thesis statement is a sentence that expresses the essay's
main idea.
How would you describe the thesis of the two readings in this
unit? Complete these sentences in your notebook.Discuss
your ideas with the class.
1. In Blink, Malcolm Gladwell claims that ...
2 . In The Wisdom of Crowds,James Surowiecki argues that ...
After You Read
Vocabulary Activities

C. Answer Key:
After You Read
Vocabulary Activities
After You Read
Vocabulary Activities
D. The chart above shows some common collocations, or word
partners, for selected target vocabulary. Refer to the chart and
complete these sentences. Compare work with a partner.
1. The dominant .................................... of transportation within
the campus was bicycles.
2. The article furnished some rather surprising ........................... on
the educational achievement of children in the program.
3. A child's participation in the program requires
the ............................ of the parents.
4. The new regulations received a very negative ...........................
from the state's businesses.
After You Read
Vocabulary Activities
D. The chart above shows some common collocations, or word
partners, for selected target vocabulary. Refer to the chart and
complete these sentences. Compare work with a partner.
5. The business failed when it was unable to ................................
To changing markets.
6. They examined the available ................................ and decided to
sell the company to one of their competitors.
7. Businesses had no choice but to .............................. to the new
regulations or stop doing business in the state.
8. As of yet, the state has no mechanism for .................................
these regulations.
After You Read
Vocabulary Activities

D. Answer Key:
After You Read
Vocabulary Activities
E. Individually or in a small group, write grammatical and
meaningful sentences that include these sequences of
words.
1. ... usual ... mode ... travel
• The usual mode of travel was by car or bus.
2 . ... adapt to ... the changing situation ...
3 .... collect...statistics ... on how many students ...
4 .... elicit...a favorable response when ...
5 . ... obtain ... the consent of. .. before ...
6 .... only option ... conform to ... standards ...
After You Read
Vocabulary Activities
E. Answer Key:
WRITING AND DISCUSSION TOPICS
Research Assignment
Each student should choose one of
the topics on page 112 to write
about and present it next session.

Thank you