Malcom Gladwell's Blink

Every aspect of your life is determined by decisions you make. However, a major fraction of that decision making happens without you realizing that you are making judgments. In Malcom Gladwell’s novel, Blink, he explores human intuition and how our subconscious effects our decisions and our life overall. Gladwell defends his position that a split second assertion can convey just as much information as a long study of a subject, and that we can use our natural intuition to better decipher the world around us. Gladwell references many different studies and opinions from professionals of neurological studies. Among them is John Gottman, who is a researcher of marital relationships and how mental cues and micro expressions can indicate the tone of the marriage, and suggest at the future success of the union. Gladwell associates Gottman’s work with the way our minds subconsciously read a situation, and make judgments as to the tone of situations in our own lives. Gladwell’s theory is called “thin slicing” and he uses the analysis of couples’ conversations by viewing small sections as an example of how we thin slice in our everyday lives. We take in small …show more content…
“There can be as much value in the blink of an eye as in months of rational analysis”. He demonstrates this by telling the story of a statue that was put under months of intense scrutiny to determine its authenticity, and passed all the arduous tests. Shortly after, however, an art expert took one look at the statue, and instinctively knew that it was a fake. The expert’s intuitive repulsion proved to be more accurate than thousands of tests. This proves his theory that thin slicing can be utilized and depended upon, so long as you practice and train your mind to decipher what it is that is happening behind the “locked door” of your

Show More

Related Documents: Malcom Gladwell's Blink

Process Of Decision Making On Neuroscientific Lens