Individual Psychology of Decision-Making

Abstract

In the preceding chapters we have been concerned for the most part with normative decision theory, where the central problem is how a decision maker ought to act in a given situation. Clearly, the introduction of ‘ought’ inadvertently involves a system of values, for it is with respect to values that a given decision is regarded as ‘good’ (one that ought to have been taken) or ‘bad’ (one that ought not to have been taken). In normative decision theory these values are always assumed to be given when a problem is formulated. That is to say, utilities are assumed to have been assigned to the various possible outcomes of the various possible decisions.