Persuasive Communication - How Audiences Decide. 2nd Edition

Audience Decision-Making Expertise 19

before making their decisions.^89 Similar expert/novice differences regarding missing benchmark

information have been reported among other types of consumers.^90 However, even experts may

not take the time necessary to infer missing benchmark information if the amount of miss-

ing information is large or if they are not confi dent in their ability to make the inferences

accurately.^91

Decision Schemata of Expert Audiences

Decision Schemata: The Audience’s Decision-Making Framework

When experts’ decision criteria and benchmarks are plotted out, they form a grid or decision

matrix. Table 1.1 shows an example of a decision matrix for deciding on a laptop computer

in 2015. The fi rst column of the matrix lists possible decision criteria. The fi rst row indicates

the recommended laptop and benchmark, or alternative, laptops. The cells of the matrix give

the values for the recommended and benchmark laptops. But do such matrix representations

have any psychological reality? Do they refl ect something about the underlying structure of

decision-making expertise? Research suggests the answer is yes. Expert decision makers appear

to have decision-specifi c knowledge structures,^92 or mental representations, stored in their

long-term memories that correspond to decision matrices. It is these knowledge structures that

lead experts to mentally represent each alternative they consider as values along a number of

attributes or decision criteria.^93

Cognitive scientists call such knowledge structures schemata.^94 Schemata are mental frameworks

that reside in an expert’s long-term memory and into which new information can be fi tted and

made sense of.^95 Other terms for schemata include scripts ,^96 frames ,^97 mental models ,^98 templates ,^99

and knowledge representations.^100

Some scientists believe schemata are stored in the prefrontal cortex of the brain.^101 Other sci-

entists fi nd evidence for schemata being distributed over different areas of the cortex.^102 More

recently, neuroscientists have demonstrated that the medial prefrontal cortex, interacting with the

hippocampus, is involved in assimilating new information into existing schemata and in retrieving

it later as needed for decision making.^103

Schemata, like the decision matrix illustrated in Table 1.1 , consist of slots that indicate the

expert’s knowledge relevant to a particular decision as well as empty slots that can be fi lled with

situation-specifi c information called slot values.^104 In Table 1.1 the slot values for the laptop

TABLE 1.1 Decision Matrices Incorporate Both Decision Criteria and Benchmarks

DECISION
CRITERIA

RECOMMENDATION

Laptop under consideration

BENCHMARK 1

Comparable laptop

BENCHMARK 2

Current laptop

Year, make, and
model

2015 13”

Apple MacBook Air

2015 13”

Apple MacBook Pro

with Retina display

2014 11”

Apple MacBook Air

Processor speed 1.6GHz 2.9GHz 1.3GHz
Memory 4GB SDRAM 8GB SDRAM 4GB SDRAM

Storage 256GB Flash Storage 512GB Flash Storage 128GB Flash Storage

Display quality Very good Excellent Very good

Retail price $1,200 $1,800 $1,000 (new)