It sounds to me like your goal is to consistently override your Type 1 responses with better Type 2 responses. In an environment like nursing where you presumably have to make decisions quickly, I don’t think you can make decisions quickly enough this way (cf. Blink). CFAR describes rationality not as the habit of overriding Type 1 responses but as the habit of improving communication between the Type 1 and Type 2 parts of your brain, which among other things improves your Type 1 responses.
There are lots of times when I use Type 1 responses, and they’re perfectly appropriate and correct. Maybe this is even most of the time. A significant part of nursing is procedural knowledge learned until it becomes reflex. I don’t have to think too hard about mixing IV meds anymore, and this is a good thing. In fact, wanting to have more developed and useful Type 1 responses is a big part of why I chose to study nursing, although I didn’t have that vocabulary at the time.
But for self-improvement purposes, I can pretty much ignore what I do right and focus on what I do wrong. And the “critical thinking” aspect of nursing is one thing that I doubt ever becomes reflex. There’s never going to be a point when I’ve seen every possible situation and know intuitively what’s wrong with my patient, with their confusing and unexpected symptoms, without having to think about it.
I do expect it to get easier–partly because my theory knowledge will be more integrated, with more association chains to things I’ve actually seen in real life, and partly because right now I’m running a lot more than just critical thinking on Type 2. There are a ton more skills that will eventually become reflexes, but they haven’t yet, and right now they’re taking up a ton of working memory.
Also, I think it’s a misconception that all decisions in nursing happen too quickly for Type 2 processes to be useful. Some things are very time-critical, but they tend to be the things that don’t take a lot of thought anyway. If my patient gets accidentally disconnected from the ventilator, I really don’t have to think very hard about whether or not I should reconnect them. It’s basically a reflex. (I don’t know who designed the tubing to get disconnected so easily.) If a patient goes into cardiac arrest, that’s obviously very time-critical, and dealing with it is fairly complex–which is why their are procedures in place that we’ve been drilled on since first year, and algorithms for the doctors to follow so they don’t have to think it out on the spot.
But quite a lot of complex problems aren’t super time-critical. Usually it takes time for a patient’s condition to change. The hard part is noticing early on, and knowing the difference between a not-important and an important change–whether or not stopping and figuring out what’s going on is more of a priority than preparing meds and charting and changing dressings and all the other busywork of nursing. That’s a skill that can probably be trained to the 5-second level. Once you’ve noticed that something confusing is going on, you do need to use Type 2 reasoning to figure out what and why.
The hard part is noticing early on, and knowing the difference between a not-important and an important change
Hmm. This sounds like it would be best done with a mix of Type 1 and Type 2 processes, e.g. Type 1 flags things for your attention and Type 2 assesses whether they actually deserve your attention, or something like that. But I’m not a domain expert.
I think you’re right. The Type 1 flags come from a combination of theory and hands-on experience, and become reflexes quite early on. Mine work fairly well. The type 2 part, assessing whether or not it deserves your attention, seems to be to be about 10 million times harder for me, and is mostly what I’m trying to work on. I ask my preceptor “is this normal or should I be freaked out?” a lot. Of course, she rarely tells me straight up, and usually tries to make me reason through it on my own with a series of guiding questions.
Glad to hear that clarified. I’ve been using rationality to build up Type 1 responses since I found LessWrong, but there’s still a lot of cultural baggage that tells me that intelligence/rationality is all about the Type 2 responses.
It sounds to me like your goal is to consistently override your Type 1 responses with better Type 2 responses. In an environment like nursing where you presumably have to make decisions quickly, I don’t think you can make decisions quickly enough this way (cf. Blink). CFAR describes rationality not as the habit of overriding Type 1 responses but as the habit of improving communication between the Type 1 and Type 2 parts of your brain, which among other things improves your Type 1 responses.
Clarification:
There are lots of times when I use Type 1 responses, and they’re perfectly appropriate and correct. Maybe this is even most of the time. A significant part of nursing is procedural knowledge learned until it becomes reflex. I don’t have to think too hard about mixing IV meds anymore, and this is a good thing. In fact, wanting to have more developed and useful Type 1 responses is a big part of why I chose to study nursing, although I didn’t have that vocabulary at the time.
But for self-improvement purposes, I can pretty much ignore what I do right and focus on what I do wrong. And the “critical thinking” aspect of nursing is one thing that I doubt ever becomes reflex. There’s never going to be a point when I’ve seen every possible situation and know intuitively what’s wrong with my patient, with their confusing and unexpected symptoms, without having to think about it.
I do expect it to get easier–partly because my theory knowledge will be more integrated, with more association chains to things I’ve actually seen in real life, and partly because right now I’m running a lot more than just critical thinking on Type 2. There are a ton more skills that will eventually become reflexes, but they haven’t yet, and right now they’re taking up a ton of working memory.
Also, I think it’s a misconception that all decisions in nursing happen too quickly for Type 2 processes to be useful. Some things are very time-critical, but they tend to be the things that don’t take a lot of thought anyway. If my patient gets accidentally disconnected from the ventilator, I really don’t have to think very hard about whether or not I should reconnect them. It’s basically a reflex. (I don’t know who designed the tubing to get disconnected so easily.) If a patient goes into cardiac arrest, that’s obviously very time-critical, and dealing with it is fairly complex–which is why their are procedures in place that we’ve been drilled on since first year, and algorithms for the doctors to follow so they don’t have to think it out on the spot.
But quite a lot of complex problems aren’t super time-critical. Usually it takes time for a patient’s condition to change. The hard part is noticing early on, and knowing the difference between a not-important and an important change–whether or not stopping and figuring out what’s going on is more of a priority than preparing meds and charting and changing dressings and all the other busywork of nursing. That’s a skill that can probably be trained to the 5-second level. Once you’ve noticed that something confusing is going on, you do need to use Type 2 reasoning to figure out what and why.
Thanks for the clarification!
Hmm. This sounds like it would be best done with a mix of Type 1 and Type 2 processes, e.g. Type 1 flags things for your attention and Type 2 assesses whether they actually deserve your attention, or something like that. But I’m not a domain expert.
I think you’re right. The Type 1 flags come from a combination of theory and hands-on experience, and become reflexes quite early on. Mine work fairly well. The type 2 part, assessing whether or not it deserves your attention, seems to be to be about 10 million times harder for me, and is mostly what I’m trying to work on. I ask my preceptor “is this normal or should I be freaked out?” a lot. Of course, she rarely tells me straight up, and usually tries to make me reason through it on my own with a series of guiding questions.
Glad to hear that clarified. I’ve been using rationality to build up Type 1 responses since I found LessWrong, but there’s still a lot of cultural baggage that tells me that intelligence/rationality is all about the Type 2 responses.
You use Type 2 reasoning to decide the laws that you train Type 1 reasoning to follow.
(See also: The 5-Second Level.)
That’s pretty much the conclusion I’d reached, but it’s nice to hear I’m not alone in it :)