Module 4 Part 1, Question 2

How do we reconcile the value of nursing experience with known heuristics and biases used in human decision making?

Well, with experience comes much knowledge. The only real way to reconcile the value of nursing experience is to take away those biases that detract from relying on experience. How do we do that? I think one of the problems with using only judgmental heuristics in practice is that mostly it is subjective in nature. Nursing or experience relies on both subjective and objective sources. According to Tversky & Kahneman (2003) the subjective nature of probability has led many students to the belief that consistency is the ONLY valid criterion by which judgments should be evaluated and people fail to infer from lifelong experiences and furthermore; statistical principles are not learned because they are not coded properly. Taking into account nursing experience and adding it to known and proven research methods is the best way to ensure that one means does not outweigh the other.