Gerd Gigerenzer is a well-known German psychologist , currently head of the Max Planck Institute for Human Development and the Harding Center of Risk Literacy. He is an important author who, in addition to his previous positions, has studied and analysed the role of heuristics and intuition in making decisions in our lives.

Throughout this article we will make a brief review of his figure, through a brief biography of Gerd Gigerenzer and a glance at his main contributions to the field of psychology.

A short biography of Gerd Gigerenzer

Gerd Gigerenzer was born in Wallersdorf, Germany, on September 3, 1947. During his youth he expressed artistic concerns, and in fact he has mentioned in some interviews that he played the banjo and even played in the group “The Munich Beefeaters” that would put the soundtrack to the first TV commercial for Volkswagen Golf. However, at one point he decided to leave that world and turn to the academic world.

He graduated in psychology from the University of Munich , and in 1977 he earned a doctorate in psychology at the same university with a thesis that would analyze non-metric multidimensional scaling as a model of judgment behavior (Nonmetrische multidimensionale Skalierung als Modell des Urteils Verhaltens). That same year he would start working as a professor of psychology at the same institution that had trained him.

In 1984 he moved to the University of Konstanz, where he stayed until he moved back to the University of Salzburg in 1990. Two years later he left that position to work as a professor of psychology at the University of Chicago.

Throughout his career as a professor, he would be the tutor of the doctorate of another great and renowned psychologist, Daniel Goldstein, with whom he would begin to theorize about the recognition and heuristic processing of reality .

It was in 1995 that, in view of his contribution to the psychological field, he was appointed director of the Max Planck Institute for Human Development, a position he still holds today. Since 2008, he has also directed the Harding Center for Risk Literacy. He also directed the Center for Adaptive Behavior and Cognition (ABC) at the same institute. He married Lorraine Daston, a well-known historian of science and a great authority on the history of scientific and intellectual development of European modernity, with whom he has a daughter in common.

Your life today

He is a member of the Berlin-Brandenburg Academy of Sciences, as well as the German Academy of Sciences and an honorary member of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences and the American Philosophical Society. Throughout his career he has received numerous awards , such as the German Psychology Award, and has several honorary doctorates from other universities, such as the Open University of the Netherlands. His publications are also highly recognized, among them Instinctive Decisions. The intelligence of the unconscious (Calculated Risks, Gut Feelings: The Intelligence of the Unconscious). Finally, he is linked to several projects, such as one in which he works together with the Bank of England, “Simple Heuristics for a Safer World”.

His work and areas of research

Gerd Gigerenzer’s contributions to the field of psychology are many, of which we will mention some of the best known.

Elements that stand out throughout his career are his interest in aspects such as decision making, the role of heuristics , the restriction of time and uncertainty in it and the great power of intuition, social intelligence, risk communication and the training and strategies of doctors, judges and managers in decision making.

Perhaps the best known of these is the defence of the role of intuition in decision making, which has traditionally been considered as something aberrant and which makes the choice difficult. Unlike most authors, Gigerenzer argues that most people make decisions based on their intuition, starting from an unconscious intelligence.

The author also indicates that intuition is a product of evolution, the result of learning the rules that our species has acquired and incorporated into its repertoire. This is used in making all kinds of decisions, especially those that involve emotional elements such as the choice of partner.

Mental shortcuts are useful

Studies conducted at the Max-Planck Institute show that, contrary to what logic seems to dictate, those who are guided by intuition tend to make effective decisions by using shortcuts. These mental shortcuts would save cognitive resources and allow quick decision making, and the strategies used for this are called heuristics. However, a logical analysis requires locating and analyzing all the possibilities, something that requires time and generates a less efficient choice.

The risk exists in choosing the rule that can best be applied to each case, something that for example could have negative consequences in the formation of prejudices and stereotypes, and cognitive biases could appear. In these cases, the problem would be that one of the rules learned and acquired throughout the subject’s own life is being generalized, but not one applicable to the particular case in question.

Another element for which it is better known is the idea of the “Adaptive Toolbox” , which mainly proposes that we have different cognitive systems, using one or another according to the need to adapt to a given situation. Different domains of thought require different cognitive mechanisms, this idea being contrary to the existence of a universal strategy.

Bibliographic references:

  • Gigerenzer, G. (2008). Instinctive decisions. The intelligence of the unconscious. Barcelona: Editorial Ariel.
  • Gigerenzer, G & Selten, R. (2001). Bounded Rationality: The Adaptive Toolbox. Dahlem Workshop Reports.
  • Corrales, E. (2010). Intuition as a cognitive process. Communication, Year 31, 19 (2): 33-42.