EA Efficacy and Community Norms (with Stefan Schubert)

1. Invest in High-Quality Pre-K

Support and implement high-quality pre-kindergarten programs, as they yield massive long-term benefits in educational attainment, economic stability, and overall societal well-being, with a significant financial return on investment.

2. De-emphasize Standard Interviews

Avoid using typical 30-minute ‘get acquainted’ interviews for hiring or admissions, as they are largely worthless for predicting intellectual or social skills and can lead to poor judgment.

3. Prioritize Application Folders

When evaluating candidates, give significant weight to application folders containing GPA, recommendations, and specific accomplishments, as this evidence is a much better predictor of future performance than standard interviews.

4. Avoid Sunk Cost Fallacy

Do not continue a project or activity merely to justify past investments of time, money, or energy, as these ‘sunk costs’ are irrecoverable regardless of future action.

5. Alternate Conscious and Unconscious Thought

For complex problems, alternate between letting your subconscious mull over ideas and consciously evaluating those ideas, using both modes of thought as complementary tools.

6. Override Sunk Cost in Relationships

Do not apply the sunk cost principle rigidly to long-term relationships like marriage, as periods of unhappiness are normal, and commitment can help navigate ‘periods of unlove’ for future benefit, especially with children involved.

7. Conduct Explicit Cost-Benefit Analysis

Apply explicit cost-benefit analysis to major decisions, especially those with widespread societal impact (like public health policies), to thoroughly weigh all potential positive and negative outcomes.

8. Recognize Environmental Impact on IQ

Understand that environmental factors significantly influence IQ, especially in diverse or deprived settings, meaning interventions can profoundly affect intellectual development.

9. Trust Your Gut for Preferences

For aesthetic or preference judgments, rely on your gut feeling and unobserved processes, as conscious verbal analysis can sometimes lead to worse decisions.

10. Implement Structured Interviews

If interviews are necessary, use a highly structured format where questions are specified and asked in a precise order, as this approach can yield predictive information for specific roles.

11. Assess Variability for Evidence Needs

When making a judgment, consider the inherent variability of the subject matter; highly variable things (like weather) require much more evidence than stable things (like chemical properties).

12. Start Projects Early

Begin working on complex tasks, like term papers, as early as possible to allow your unconscious mind to process information and generate ideas over time.

13. Sleep on Difficult Problems

When stuck on a challenging problem, take a break and sleep on it, as the unconscious mind can continue working and often provides solutions upon waking.

14. Encourage Conversational Interaction

Engage in ‘serve and return’ conversations with children, where questions are asked and elaborated upon, as this interactive dialogue is a powerful context for learning and vocabulary expansion.

15. Foster Explicit Rule-Following

Engage children in activities that involve explicit rule-following, like board games with detailed instructions or cooking with recipes, to create a context for structured learning and intellectual growth.

16. Prioritize More Evidence

Base judgments and problem solutions on as much evidence as possible, recognizing that a greater quantity of evidence generally leads to more accurate outcomes, assuming quality is equal.

17. Refine Intuition with Reflection

When making decisions, allow your intuition to quickly identify promising options, then use conscious reflection to critically evaluate and narrow down those choices.

18. Acknowledge Unconscious Influence

Recognize that many important behaviors and thoughts are driven by unconscious processes, as merely knowing this can be useful.

19. Leverage Sunk Costs for Motivation

Intentionally create sunk costs (e.g., paying for a gym membership in advance) to motivate yourself to follow through on beneficial activities, even if it’s a known psychological ’trick’.

20. Use Interviews for Relevant Social Skills

Employ brief interviews specifically to assess social skills when those skills are directly relevant and crucial to the job’s performance, such as for a charismatic salesperson or a cocktail waitress.

21. Seek Trusted Book Recommendations

To avoid wasting time on potentially uninteresting books, only read those that have been personally recommended by someone you trust and who has read the book.

22. Embrace Learning Stages

Understand that learning often progresses from initial poor intuitions, to explicit strategies, and finally to intuitive mastery, allowing you to discard formal rules once they become automatic.

23. Acknowledge Interview Bias

Be aware that unstructured interviews can introduce socially injurious biases based on race, ethnicity, or cultural unfamiliarity, leading to unfair and inaccurate hiring decisions.

24. Be Aware of Mimicry Bias

Understand that unconscious mimicry of behavior can unfairly increase liking for an interviewee, potentially leading to biased hiring decisions unrelated to job qualifications.