The Weight

of Emotions
on Decision-
Making
by student: Kassym Ubaidolla
(ITM-2102)
About decision-making
• According to Saaty (2008) many factors go into decision-making, enabling a
person to assess their options and make the best and most advantageous
choice.
• There are two approaches to decision-making (rational and emotional).
• The first approach, known as the rational choice model of decision-making,
makes the assumption that decision-makers are familiar with enough
pertinent knowledge about their environments to analyze their options and
reach a decision logically (Bruch & Feinberg, 2017)
• When a person starts making decisions, they learn that numerous elements
need to be taken into consideration in order to determine whether they
should adopt an emotive or a rational approach.
Four factors that influence to a decision.
• These factors are information, time constraints,relevance, and
commitment.
• First, making judgments calls for knowledge that will enable a person
to assess their situation and reach a well-informed decision (Pfister
and Böhm 2008).
• The accuracy of a decision made with heuristics is lower. In order to
fulfil this first requirement of rational decision-making, one must
carefully analyze the context of the situation in order to reduce the
possibility of a faulty decision (Gigerenzer & Gaissmaier, 2011)
First & Second, Third factors
• Second, making decisions calls for time restrictions. Time constraints
have a significant role in real-world decision-making and can lead a
person to choose one alternative over another (Pfister & Böhm 2008).
• For example,when a person has deadline, he/she will think about in
quicker and more direct manner.
• Decisions require that a person determine if the information
presented is truly relevant to the situation (Pfister and Böhm, 2008).
• Not all information benefits our decision-making process, and some
information can cloud our ability to judge the relevance of other
information (Saaty, 2008)
Last factor
• The last factor is about social and moral values that help individual to
make a decision.
• People tend not to change their preferences and stick with their
decisions while making choices that involve extensive consideration of
external circumstances.
About emotional approach
• Decision making is influenced by emotional perspectives which have
the potential to create antagonistic feelings or ambivalence, which
make decision-making difficult (Pfister & Böhm, 2008)
• Ambivalence makes a person feel internally conflicted, which makes
decision-making more challenging. When a person does not feel torn
about which belief should guide their thinking, they are better able to
make deliberate decisions.
• Emotions are taken into account when making decisions, along with
other "random" pieces of information that may not initially seem to
have a big impact but are actually very important.
About 3 interpersonal social emotions
• Three interpersonal social emotions—obligation, sympathy, and resentment—
can affect a person's choice in a different way than more fundamental
emotions like happiness, sadness, and rage.
• With basic emotions, a person's mood is directly impacted and may influence
their decision-making in one direction or another. Additionally, facial
expressions make the most basic emotions obvious (Anonymous, 2012).
• Although not often apparent, interpersonal social emotions are influenced by
a person's interior ideas and mental processes (Anonymous, 2012). Due to
interpersonal social emotions, making a decision requires more thought and
deliberation. Because they are situational and subject to individual
interpretation, these emotions have an indirect impact.
About obligation
• A person is motivated to help someone out of an emotional sense of
obligation because they believe they owe the person something. A
person might be persuaded to make a choice because they have a great
desire to help others, and they might pass up the possibility to gain
anything for themselves in the process.
• Obligation can also be looked at in terms of personality quality, and
agreeableness.People who are friendlier are more likely to think well of
people (Organ, Podsakoff, & MacKenzie, 2006) and help others when
they recognize an unfulfilled need. With an obligation component, a
student may feel driven to make a decision based on the fact that
another person made a sacrifice previously for them
About sympathy

• Another emotional factor, sympathy, might lead someone to act

altruistically and choose to put the needs of others before their own.
• Empathy allows us to understand the emotions and sensations of
others and this helps us connect with others when we make decisions
(Frith & Singer, 2008)
• Therefore, the role of sympathy in decision-making influences us to
think unselfishly and to form decisions that may benefit others.
About resentment
• The third emotional factor is resentment, which can lead someone to
act selfishly in an effort to maximize their profits.
• humans have a potential to think selfishly and make decisions that
only benefit themselves rather than themselves and others.
• Unlike obligation, it appears that resentment causes humans to make
decisions that are based on selfishness.
The methodology and results
• Participants were given 16 scenarios in which they had to make decisions
involving a close friend.
• Participants gave their yes or no answers and indicated whether or not their
conclusion was logical or emotional for each situation.
• They evaluated their choice from -10 to +10 on a scale. A very emotional rating
would be +10, a very logical rating would be -10, and a neutral rating would be 0.
• Participants received the resentment component as additional information if
they said yes. Participants were then shown the sympathy component if they
chose no and provided a rating of less than or equal to zero.
• The obligation component was then provided to participants who chose no and
gave a rating of more than zero.
2) Table

1) Table

3) Table
Conclusion
• Decision-making is regarded as a rational process that requires taking into account a
variety of elements, including information, relevance, and time restraints. The rationality
of the process might be compromised if just the logical aspects of a situation were
considered while making decisions (Pfister & Böhm, 2008).
• Additionally, decisions are made differently depending on the circumstance and
environment (Dricu & Frühholz, 2019).
• Emotions are a significant aspect that affect decision-making and provide us the
opportunity to consider the choice from several angles. Emotions affect our capacity to
analyze circumstances logically and make the best decisions for both ourselves and
others.
• Making the best choice is less likely when emotions are absent. In conclusion, reasoning
and feeling each play a different part in the decision-making process and are important
in helping us make choices that will help us, and others succeed.
 Reference
• Anonymous (2012). “6.3 Emotions and Interpersonal Communication.” A Primer on
Communication Studies, 1.0, pp. 355–365.
• Bruch, E., and Feinberg, F. (2017). Decision-Making Processes in Social Contexts.
Annual Review of Sociology, 43(1), 207–227. doi: 10.1146/annurev-soc-060116-053622
• Dricu, M., and Frühholz, S. (2019). A neurocognitive model of perceptual decision-
making on emotional signals. Human Brain Mapping 41(6). https://doi-
org.ezproxy.hofstra.edu/10.1002/hbm.24893
• Frith, C. D., and Singer, T. (2008). The role of social cognition in decision making.
PubMed Central, 363(1511), 3875–3886. doi: 10.1098/rstb.2008.0156
• Organ, D. W., Podsakoff, P. M., and MacKenzie, S. B. (2006). Organizational Citizenship
Behavior. Thousand Oaks, California: Sage Publications, Inc., 81-82
• Pfister, H.-R., and Böhm, G. (2008). The multiplicity of emotions: A framework of
emotional functions in decision making. Judgment and Decision Making, 3(1), 5–17.
Retrieved from http://journal.sjdm.org/bb1.pdf
• Saaty, T.L. (2008). Decision making with the analytic hierarchy process. International
Journal of Services Sciences 1(1), 83-98