Use this activity to engage all types of learners, while requiring that they refer to and incorporate details from the text over the course of the activity.

“Blink, Under Pressure: Testing Fast-and-Frugal Thinking in Ethical Dilemmas”

In this activity, students will put Gladwell’s concepts around the power of intuition to the test by applying their own Fast-and-Frugal thinking to highly difficult and morally ambiguous scenarios.

Gladwell’s main advice for how to sharpen your Fast-and-Frugal Thinking skills is to simply use them. In this exercise, you will be given the chance to hone your own intuitive skills by applying your gut instinct to a series of scenarios that present moral dilemmas. Use your best—and fastest—judgment to come up with a solution to each scenario, while remembering that there are no right answers.

Create a scenario for each of the following questions, each of which suggests a different moral dilemma. Then, take no more than 3 minutes to write 3-4 sentences on the decision you’d make, and your reasoning behind it:

• You can only save one—who will it be?
• Would you sacrifice one person to save several?
• What should you believe when evidence points to a trusted friend?

Once everyone has written their responses, discuss your scenarios and answers as a class.