Decisions and Disasters: Modeling Decisions that Contribute to Mishaps

Wilf, Joel; Port, Dan

doi:10.1109/hicss.2016.697

Cited by 3 publications

(3 citation statements)

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“…In our study of NASA mishaps, we found a recurring pattern of flawed decision-making [1]. Decision-makers often mis-estimated one or more risks to the mission.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 85%

“…In an earlier study, we examined a set of ten NASA mishaps, taking place from 1986 to 2013 and ranging in impact from the loss of life down to being only a "close call" [1]. These are shown in Reviewing these mishaps, we found that for over half of them, an uncertainty surrounding an important risk was mis-classified -and this contributed to the mishap.…”

Section: Other Mishap Examplesmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Decision-makers often mis-estimated one or more risks to the mission. There were many reasons for this error, including overconfidence, cognitive bias, and groupthink [1]. The results were poor quality decisions that, in some cases, led to the loss of missions and even human life [1], [2], [3].…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

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Classifying Risk Uncertainty for Decision Making

Port

Wilf

2019

Proceedings of the Annual Hawaii International Conference on System Sciences

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Studies of NASA mishaps often reveal a flawed decision-making process-one that underestimates risk. In this paper we turn our attention from the risk itself to uncertainty about the risk. In particular, we look at how decision-making accounts for uncertainties about a risk's likelihood of occurring and the consequence if it does occur. We propose a simple way of classifying risks according to these uncertainties. Then we use this classification scheme to gain insight into the flawed decision-making that contributed to the Challenger disaster and other NASA mishaps as well. We show how our risk classification scheme can improve decision-making and help avoid mishaps in the future.

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“…In our study of NASA mishaps, we found a recurring pattern of flawed decision-making [1]. Decision-makers often mis-estimated one or more risks to the mission.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 85%

Section: Other Mishap Examplesmentioning

confidence: 99%