Search results

For decision‐makers, the cognitive limit is one of the most critical factors which determine the quality of decisions, when they do not have enough information about their decision environment, and when they must strike a balance between conflicting objectives within a time limit. In such a situation, their decision‐making is often characterized by satisficing behaviors with multiple objectives under uncertainty. This paper aims to formulate a multiple‐objective satisficing problem and to study its fundamental properties, such as (1) existence of collectively satisficing solutions, (2) relationship among collectively satisficing solutions, Pareto satisficing solutions, weak Pareto satisficing solutions and max‐min solutions, and (3) characterization of Pareto satisficing solutions and of weak Pareto satisficing solutions.

As pointed out by Simon, the “satisficing” decision criterion is one of the most fundamental principles which describe human behaviors. Its mathematical representation i.e., a “satisficing” (decision) problem, is specified by Mesarovic as follows. “Find a decision alternative whose performance is equal to or greater than a given aspiration level for each uncertainty.” Of the results already published about such “satisficing” problems, Mesarovic and Takahara's existence theorem of ‘satisficing’ solutions is most important. However, it requires relatively tight assumptions. Hence, the objective of this paper is to generalize it, in order to enhance its applicability. This is fulfilled by the application of the Teichmüller and Tukey Lemma.

School improvement planning, especially for low-performing schools, can be conceptualized as a planning process to strategically improve organizational processes, operations and outcomes. However, bureaucratic procedures and related inflexibilities sometimes results in inauthentic plan development. The purpose of this paper is to analyze the extent and ways in which principals engage in satisficing behavior – or being in the realm of “good enough” – when developing school improvement plans (SIPs).

The authors qualitatively analyzed 364 short-cycle SIPs submitted by principals of 134 low-performing schools participating across three cohorts of a university-based systems leadership program focused on change leadership and school turnaround.

Eight satisficing behaviors in the SIPs were identified. The five most prominent satisficing behaviors follow: plan content is consistent across schools within a district; a plan or plan features are resubmitted; plan priorities focus solely on test scores; plan timeline is insufficiently considered; and the directly responsible individual (DRI) (to complete tasks) is insufficiently considered. Overall, 80 percent of SIPs contained two to four satisficing behaviors, and fewer than ten SIPs were free of such behaviors or, in the authors’ estimation, completely authentic.

The development of SIPs is mandated for the nation’s lowest-performing schools, but little analysis of such plans has been conducted over the last 20 years. Moreover, although the notion that principals engage in satisficing behavior has been raised previously, to the authors’ knowledge, this is the first study to systematically identify ways in which principals satisfice.

In order to improve the supply chain performance, organizations need to improve the efficiency of vendors. Although many techniques are used for vendor efficiency measurement, there is a lack of research about defining satisficing level to analyze improvement potential of vendors. The purpose of this paper is to incorporate satisficing level of some outputs to determine efficiency improvement potential of existing vendors.

Method used in this paper is an extension of Data Envelopment Analysis, which has been used frequently for efficiency measurement of Decision Making Units. This method is known as Efficiency Analysis Technique with Output Satisficing (EATWOS), which has been mainly used in the field of economics for efficiency measurement.

A case illustration of a National Capital Region of Delhi, India, based manufacturer and distributor of packaged drinking water is depicted to portray the practical application of EATWOS in vendor efficiency evaluation and their relative ranking. This method has helped in evaluating the improvement potential in performance of given vendors and helping in strategic decision making for the given organization

In case of more variables, this method becomes more complex to get the solution. Second, sometimes difference in vendors ranking without and with satisficing concept is very less, as in this case. Therefore, recording and analysis of output data of vendors should be done very carefully.

Major implications of this study is that while selecting vendors, organizations should also try to understand improvement potential for given vendors by applying satisficing concept as given in this research. This approach helps in analyzing improvement potentials of suppliers.

This paper explores an innovative approach to rank vendors on basis of certain criteria after considering the satisficing concept and improvement potentials of vendors.

Presents and compares two contrasting managerial attitudes towards strategic decisions. The first attitude is called maximizing behaviour, and it is founded on a set of assumptions that are unattainable in real‐world decision making. The use of this attitude invariably results in a failed strategic decision. The second managerial attitude is called satisficing behaviour, and its use is demonstrably conducive to strategic decision success. Applications of real‐world successful and failed strategic decisions tend to confirm the case for satisficing behaviour in quest of successful strategic outcomes.

The purpose of this paper is to gain insight into managers' decision‐making practices when challenged by inappropriate information quality, and to test frameworks developed from research to see whether they apply to these managers.

This exploratory, multiple case study used the critical incident technique in 19 semi‐structured interviews. Responses were analyzed using framework analysis, a matrix‐based content analysis technique, and then considered with respect to the research literature on information overload, information poverty and satisficing.

The managers in this study tended to satisfice (terminate the search process and make a good enough decision, while recognizing that information gaps remain). Those challenged by too little information appear to fit descriptions of information poverty, while others described aspects of information overload.

A shortage of information behavior research on managers makes it difficult to conclude whether these results are typical of managers in general or of healthcare services managers specifically. Further research is needed to confirm initial findings and address questions suggested by this paper.

This paper suggests that existing definitions for the concepts of information poverty and information overload can be used to describe managers' experiences.

This paper contributes to what is known about information behavior in managers in general and healthcare services managers specifically. It may serve as an example of how to consider new research findings within existing frameworks.

The role of personal value systems as antecedents to risk has been largely ignored. Following Gigerenzer's view of ecological rationality, the authors argue an individual's personal value system serves as concrete motivations that guide risky choices and facilitate adaptation to one's environment.

The authors elicit risk attitudes using a satisficing-based risk elicitation method that exploits the idea of worst-case aspiration or minimum portfolio returns given a portfolio comprising a safe and risky prospect. The elicited worst-case aspiration allows for more descriptive and natural ways of characterizing attitudes to risk (i.e. satisficing measures of risk). Using the Schwartz Value Survey, the authors assess the relative importance individuals place on value systems, such as personal focus versus social focus. The authors argue that preference to value systems has linkages with the worst-case aspiration setting emphasized in the satisficing task.

This study’s findings suggest that individuals who are willing to give up higher potential returns to protect their downside risk (by setting higher worst-case aspiration) are positively associated with personal focus—concern about own outcomes than social focus—concern about the outcomes for others or established institutions.

Currently, the study’s setting is in the domain of financial decision-making. Going forward, milestones could be set for studying risky real-world choices by simply changing the risk measure in different contexts, such as job choices, education, health and social interactions.

This study contributes to the discussion on the psychometric structure of risk. Prescriptive benefits of satisficing as a positive heuristic, which is interpreted as setting achievable goals or aspiration levels, are extensive and recognized in various industries ranging from agriculture, airlines, insurance to financial advising. More recently, cognitive processes, such as emotions and personal value systems, are recognized as a type of social cognition that subserve heuristic functions that can guide behavior quickly and accurately.

Over the past 20 years, the primary focus of education policy and programming in low- and middle-income country contexts has shifted from access to quality. There has also been a laudable increase in the amount of available research about education quality in low- and middle-income countries, and a growing emphasis placed on incorporating research- and evidence-based activities and approaches into donor-funded education programs, particularly for early grade reading. Reviews of early grade reading (EGR) programs and their level of impact, however, particularly when programs are implemented at large scale, may leave some practitioners, policy makers, and donors dismayed. Effect sizes and impacts of the programs are often positive, but the absolute gains in reading performance are not as dramatic as we would like, despite the implementation of evidence-based approaches.

In education policy and implementation literature, the decoupling of policy and implementation, and the messiness involved in putting research into practice in education, are well documented. In this chapter, the authors propose the idea of “satisficing,” as it has been defined in policy and implementation literature, as a useful lens for considering the apparent decoupling of actual impacts and anticipated outcomes for programs that have adopted research- and evidence-based approaches. Using examples from EGR programs in African and Asian contexts, the authors argue that “satisficing” occurs at multiple levels, including the classroom, school, district, and even the program implementation (i.e., contractor or grantee) levels. The authors also argue that this lens has important implications for education program design and research.

The purpose of this research is to describe a discourse analysis technique which can be used to analyze text or speech that is produced by people when discussing their information practices.

The method involves coding the phrases and sentences of this interpretive discourse into the three domains of behavior investigated in psychology and education, namely, the affective domain of evaluating and intending, the cognitive domain of appraising and planning, and the sensorimotor domain of noticing, perceiving, and executing or acting.

Samples of discourse from independent published sources were categorized and coded. In every case people's self‐descriptions of their information practices are shown to contain references to their activities in these three domains. A model is presented to depict how information behavior can be represented as a continuous processing flow of satisficing and optimizing behavior. These mental behavioral procedures are practiced by individuals in information settings as members of a group or culture, and are reflected in the verbal accounts they construct about their information behavior.

The model of ecological constructionism, upon which the coding technique is based, needs to be tested in many more diverse contexts. Second, the model needs to address differences in types of information behavior such as searching, computing, blogging, etc., as well as different information settings and purposes of use, e.g. online shopping, doing job tasks with the computer, etc.

The technique can theoretically be automated and applied to the processing of large volumes of text produced daily in the online environment. The results yield a type of average digital code that can serve as an index of people's information behaviors in these diverse settings with regard to their affective, cognitive and sensorimotor activities.

The model or theory was constructed by integrating the concepts of “satisficing” and “optimizing” in decision making with research in information behavior, human ecology, social cognitive theory and ethnomethodology. The model is comprehensive and general enough to provide a potentially useful common topical reference chart for human studies in information science.

Herbert Simon's major contribution to decision‐making theory is the concept of “satisficing”. This was first posited in Administrative Behavior, published in 1947, and the book, concerned as it was with establishing a scientific approach to administrative theory, puts forward an adjustment of then‐current economic theory, which viewed administrative choice as a process of maximising. While, over the ensuing decades, Simon adjusted his definitions of both “economic man” and of “satisficing” in several subsequent publications, the original exposition of these was a major contribution to the area of administrative theory. An attempt has been made here to explore what circumstances might have led Simon into putting forward the concept of “satisficing”.