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Overview
We make countless decisions everyday. Many of the decisions we make, such as what to eat for lunch, what to wear, what book to check out of the library, what movie to go see, usually have few or no long-lasting implications. Other decisions, such as what action to take in an emergency situation, what subjects to study in school, when or whether to have children, to have a physically active lifestyle or not, can define how we live our lives and how we view ourselves and are viewed by others.
What causes different people to make such different decisions each day and over the course of their lifetimes? The answer to this question is undoubtedly rooted in nature (our genes) and nurture (the environment), but figuring out all of the influences that lead humans to make a particular decision is a daunting task. Since all animals make decisions, one way to gain some insight into this question is to begin by trying to understand the decision-making process in simpler animals. After all, our nervous systems and the nervous systems of even the simplest organisms often use similar strategies.
Why This Science Matters
Answering a question such as: “How do we decide what to do?” entails finding the answers to a whole series of sub-questions. What areas of the brain are active when we make decisions? Do different decisions activate different areas of the brain? How much of our decision-making is influenced by environmental factors, and how much is determined genetically? What brain mechanism determines how the outcome of a previous decision will impact a future decision?
Breaking a problem down into its components, or tackling a simpler, related problem in order to understand something more complex is an important tradition in science. Understanding how scientists break problems down into questions they can answer is a key step in understanding how science progresses. Whether you are an aspiring scientist, or just want to understand the science that can help you make sound medical, political or consumer choices, it is important to understand how scientific knowledge is generated. In addition, the careful, logical approaches that scientists use to solve problems are relevant for solving the everyday problems that we all face.
Lesson developed by Sherry Seethaler, UCSD.
