Blink, by Malcolm Gladwell, is a book about decision making. More specifically, it is about snap judgments — the decisions we make in the blink of an eye, without thinking. What Gladwell shows is that there is a lot more to that split second of decision making than we might think.

Gladwell explores the concept of “thin-slicing” which he defines as “a critical part of rapid cognition” and “the ability of our unconscious to find patterns in situations and behavior based on very narrow slices of experience” (23). He also explains how all of us use thin-slicing in every day situations and how this is particularly important in how we interact with others.

One interesting section of the book titled “Listening to Doctors” (39) focused on how we talk to people, and proved that when people feel “rushed or ignored or treated poorly” (40) the quality of care, or the information that they’re given doesn’t matter as much. Although the book referred to Doctors, I think we can learn a lot from this; the quality of our interactions with patrons can mean so much. It’s not just about what we say to people, it’s how we say it.

Another concept in Blink that intrigued me, is the process of finding out how others make decisions. Gladwell states that there is a right and a wrong way to ask people what they want, and points out that simply asking people what they want, more than likely will not work. And it’s not because people are lying, it’s just that truly knowing what you want is more difficult than it seems. What you think you like might not actually be true. Therefore, finding out which Library 2.0 services our patrons really want is a more difficult task than we might think.

Blink Animoto

p.s. If you haven’t it already, check out animoto — I had a lot of fun making this video 🙂