OAM 330 MIDTERM QUESTIONS AND VERIFIED
ANSWERS
Organizational Behavior - Answers - The science of behavior in work organizations
Descriptive Science - Answers - What do people do?
Interpretive Science - Answers - How and why does it happen?
Prescriptive Science - Answers - what should people do, and how can we make it
happen?
Approaches to OB - Answers - Intuition, Experience, Systematic Study
Empirical Analysis - Answers - Intuition, Anecdote, Personal Experience, Case
Studies/Expert Opinion, Other forms of systematic research, Randomized controlled
experiments, Review or synthesis of multiple experimental studies
Levels of OB - Answers - Individual, Interpersonal, Collective
Individual Level - Answers - How to avoid common decision traps and make effective
decisions; How personality and culture influence work behavior; How to motivate others
Interpersonal Level - Answers - How people acquire and use power in organizations;
How to utilize persuasion techniques to influence others; How to negotiate and manage
conflicts successfully
Collective Level - Answers - The advantages and disadvantages of teams;
Organizational structure; The power of organizational culture
Effective Decision Processes - Answers - Identify criteria, articulate options, Weight
options by criteria, Pick highest scoring option
Bounded Rationality - Answers - People do not have the ability or resources to process
all available information and alternatives when making decisions
Sacrifice - Answers - Choose the first reasonable choice available, not necessarily the
best
Biases - Answers - influence the information we choose and how we process it
Decision Biases - Answers - A cognitive shortcut or mental "rule of thumb"; can be
adaptive and functional; often overapplied
, Anchoring - Answers - A cognitive bias that describes the common human tendency to
rely too heavily on the first piece of information offered when making decisions; us an
initial piece of information to make subsequent judgements (UN/Roulette Example)
Confirmation Bias - Answers - Tendency to seek only confirming evidence, while failing
to seek disconfirming evidence
What Biases Affect - Answers - How people search for, interpret, and remember
information
Attitude Polarization - Answers - Views often become more strongly held with more
confirmation
Persistence of Discredited Beliefs - Answers - Beliefs often persist even after proven
false
Primary Effects - Answers - Initial evidence affects how people interpret subsequent
information
Overconfidence - Answers - Unwarranted faith in our own perceptions and judgments;
result: people constantly overrate their own capabilities, knowledge, and skill
Planning Fallacy - Answers - People tend to underestimate how long they will need to
complete a task and how much it will cost
Availability Heuristic - Answers - A tendency to base judgments on readily available
information
Misperception of Risk - Answers - People are much more likely to die from their own
modifiable behavior rather than from events like shark attacks; also, perception that the
world has become more violent when it has actually become less so
Loss Aversion - Answers - Losses loom larger than gains
Endowment Effect - Answers - People place substantially more value on things they
own
Risk Preference - Answers - Decisions can be framed in different ways: as gains or
losses
Escalation of Commitment - Answers - Resources committed to initial course of action,
does not produce desired return, commit more resources to turn things around and
recover initial investment, cost of failure increases; research shows that people tend to
allocate more money to failing projects and divisions than successful ones
ANSWERS
Organizational Behavior - Answers - The science of behavior in work organizations
Descriptive Science - Answers - What do people do?
Interpretive Science - Answers - How and why does it happen?
Prescriptive Science - Answers - what should people do, and how can we make it
happen?
Approaches to OB - Answers - Intuition, Experience, Systematic Study
Empirical Analysis - Answers - Intuition, Anecdote, Personal Experience, Case
Studies/Expert Opinion, Other forms of systematic research, Randomized controlled
experiments, Review or synthesis of multiple experimental studies
Levels of OB - Answers - Individual, Interpersonal, Collective
Individual Level - Answers - How to avoid common decision traps and make effective
decisions; How personality and culture influence work behavior; How to motivate others
Interpersonal Level - Answers - How people acquire and use power in organizations;
How to utilize persuasion techniques to influence others; How to negotiate and manage
conflicts successfully
Collective Level - Answers - The advantages and disadvantages of teams;
Organizational structure; The power of organizational culture
Effective Decision Processes - Answers - Identify criteria, articulate options, Weight
options by criteria, Pick highest scoring option
Bounded Rationality - Answers - People do not have the ability or resources to process
all available information and alternatives when making decisions
Sacrifice - Answers - Choose the first reasonable choice available, not necessarily the
best
Biases - Answers - influence the information we choose and how we process it
Decision Biases - Answers - A cognitive shortcut or mental "rule of thumb"; can be
adaptive and functional; often overapplied
, Anchoring - Answers - A cognitive bias that describes the common human tendency to
rely too heavily on the first piece of information offered when making decisions; us an
initial piece of information to make subsequent judgements (UN/Roulette Example)
Confirmation Bias - Answers - Tendency to seek only confirming evidence, while failing
to seek disconfirming evidence
What Biases Affect - Answers - How people search for, interpret, and remember
information
Attitude Polarization - Answers - Views often become more strongly held with more
confirmation
Persistence of Discredited Beliefs - Answers - Beliefs often persist even after proven
false
Primary Effects - Answers - Initial evidence affects how people interpret subsequent
information
Overconfidence - Answers - Unwarranted faith in our own perceptions and judgments;
result: people constantly overrate their own capabilities, knowledge, and skill
Planning Fallacy - Answers - People tend to underestimate how long they will need to
complete a task and how much it will cost
Availability Heuristic - Answers - A tendency to base judgments on readily available
information
Misperception of Risk - Answers - People are much more likely to die from their own
modifiable behavior rather than from events like shark attacks; also, perception that the
world has become more violent when it has actually become less so
Loss Aversion - Answers - Losses loom larger than gains
Endowment Effect - Answers - People place substantially more value on things they
own
Risk Preference - Answers - Decisions can be framed in different ways: as gains or
losses
Escalation of Commitment - Answers - Resources committed to initial course of action,
does not produce desired return, commit more resources to turn things around and
recover initial investment, cost of failure increases; research shows that people tend to
allocate more money to failing projects and divisions than successful ones
