Five Steps Towards Avoiding Narrative Traps in Decision-Making

Abstract

Narratives provide simple rules about how we ought to live and what our priorities ought to be. They are especially appealing in times of high uncertainty. Using the uncertainty surrounding Covid-19 as an illustration, we show how a narrative to preserve life has become dominant, and we illustrate how it has been reinforced by several behavioural biases. We argue that being able to identify and critically evaluate the impact of dominant narratives is vital to ensuring optimal decision-making. To facilitate this, we offer five recommendations—the ABCDE of decision-making—that can help to reduce the “narrative trap” in decision-making in any uncertain environment.

Accounting for Consequences and Claims in Policy

“…Empirical investigation of these issues can only get us so far. We also need to ensure that the policy-making processes better reflect the myriad concerns and impacts of policies, and we need to consider that there is a constant backdrop of a powerful social narrative to preserve life at almost any cost [40]. But that's another story.…”