Asymmetric Paternalism: Description of the Phenomenon, Explanation Based on Decisions Under Uncertainty, and Possible Applications to Education

Authors

Olga Kosheleva, The University of Texas at El PasoFollow
Francois Modave

Publication Date

4-2008

Comments

Technical Report: UTEP-CS-08-20

Published in Proceedings of the 27th International Conference of the North American Fuzzy Information Processing Society NAFIPS'2008, New York, New York, May 19-22, 2008.

Abstract

In general, human being are rational decision makers, but in many situations, they exhibit unexplained "inertia", reluctance to switch to a better decision. In this paper, we show that this seemingly irrational behavior can be explained if we take uncertainty into account; we also explain how this phenomenon can be utilized in education.