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Conflict: How Soldiers Make Impossible Decisions is about making hard choices--where all outcomes are potentially negative. The authors draw on interviews conducted with soldiers about the situations they faced and the decisions they made in war. These vivid and sometimes distressing stories allow the authors to explore the cognitive processes associated with choice, goal-directed thinking, innovation, and courage.
Conflict invites readers to consider their own responses under extreme circumstances and ask themselves how they would choose between difficult options. In doing so, this book will go some way to helping readers understand what it feels like when choosing between least-worst decisions.
List of contents
- List of illustrations
- Acknowledgements
- Foreword by Col. Tim Collins
- Preface
- 1. Decisional Conflict: From Best to Least-Worst
- 2. Military Decision Making: Doctrine, Rationality and Field-Based Approaches
- 3. The Science of Selecting Least-Worst Options
- 4. Situational Awareness
- 5. Formulating Plans
- 6. Executing Plans
- 7. Team Learning
- 8. Least-Worst Decision Making 'in extremis'
- 9. Thoughts that Haunt
- 10. How do Soldiers Do What They Do and What Can We Learn From Them?
- References
About the author
Neil Shortland, Laurence Alison, and Joseph Moran are interested in social cognition and the processes by which soldiers make sense of uncertain, high-risk, ambiguous, complex or contradictory information. They are especially interested in decision inertia and the use of simulated environments to study and train practitioners to overcome decision inertia.
Summary
Conflict: How Soldiers Make Impossible Decisions is about making hard choices--where all outcomes are potentially negative. The authors draw on interviews conducted with soldiers about the situations they faced and the decisions they made at war. These are vivid and sometimes distressing stories. They form the data from which the authors explore the cognitive processes associated with choice, commitment to action and (sometimes) error, as well as goal directed thinking, innovation and courage. By referring to real cases, Conflict invites readers to consider their own responses under extreme circumstances and ask themselves how they would choose between difficult options. In doing so this book will go some way to helping readers understand what it feels like when choosing between least-worst decisions.
Additional text
As a psychologist, professor, and researcher of military psychology, I find the concepts covered in this book to be especially applicable. Executives and business leadership may find this book valuable as well given the ways in which they operate.
