Coming soon · Book Profile
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A scientific tour of how human decisions are actually made—through a metaphor of decision-making as a manufacturing process shaped by cognitive machinery, motivational controls, and informational inputs.
A profile of this book is on the way.
What it’s about
Drawing on behavioral decision theory, consumer psychology, and neuroscience, Ryan Hamilton reveals that our choices are far stranger and more predictable than we assume. Using the vivid metaphor of decision making as a manufacturing process—cognitive machinery (the two-system model, heuristics, habits, emotions), a motivational control panel (goals, mindsets, consistency, evolutionary drives, regulatory focus), and raw informational materials (context, framing, memory, assortment, evaluability, halos)—the book shows how objectively irrelevant factors systematically bend our decisions. Whether you're a marketer, manager, policymaker, or simply someone who wants to understand your own mind, this book equips you to anticipate, understand, and influence the decisions of others and yourself, closing with four load-bearing principles: reference points, reasons, resources, and replacement.
The through-line
- Who it’s for
- A curious reader—consumer, manager, marketer, or policymaker—who wants to understand and improve how they and others make decisions.
- The problem
- Decisions—their own and others'—are mysterious, often biased, and hard to anticipate or influence. They feel confused or frustrated that their choices don't match their intentions and that they can be manipulated without realizing it.
- The plan
- Understand the cognitive machinery: the two-system model, heuristics, habits, and self-regulation.
- Learn the motivational control panel: goals, mindsets, consistency, emotions, and evolutionary and regulatory drives.
- Examine the informational raw materials: context, framing, memory, assortment, evaluability, and halo effects.
- Apply the four Rs—reference points, reasons, resources, replacement—to anticipate and influence decisions.
- The payoff
- The reader can break down complex decisions into understandable components. · They anticipate biases in themselves and others and design better choice environments. · They make more deliberate decisions and resist unhelpful manipulation.
See our guide
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Additional reading
- Diseases of Workers · Bernardo Ramazzini
Cited as the foundational text of occupational medicine, written in the early 1700s, which describes many occupationally related diseases observed in farm patients that are still recognized today.
- The Triple Bottom Line · Andrew Savitz
Introduces the concept of sustainability resting on three pillars: profit, planet, and people. The book uses this to argue that the 'people' component (human capital/worker health) is often dangerously neglected in agriculture.
- The Omnivore's Dilemma · Michael Pollan
Referenced as an example of popular literature that reflects and advocates for the rising consumer voice and public scrutiny concerning sustainable food systems, which is a major trend impacting modern agriculture.
- Silent Spring · Rachel Carson
Cited as the landmark 1962 book that launched the modern environmental movement and fundamentally shifted public and governmental attention toward the potential harms of pesticides, shaping decades of regulation and risk perception.
- Normal Accidents: Living with High-Risk Technologies · Charles Perrow
The book's theory of 'system accidents' and 'tight coupling' is used by Gonzales to explain how cascading failures, like the Mount Hood climbing disaster, are inevitable features of certain complex systems.
- The Emotional Brain & The Synaptic Self · Joseph LeDoux
LeDoux's neuroscience research on the amygdala's role in fear and memory forms the scientific backbone of Gonzales's argument about how emotion can hijack reason in a crisis.
- The Survivor Personality · Al Siebert
Gonzales cites Siebert's psychological research on the traits of survivors, such as their use of playfulness and humor to stay in contact with reality and manage threats.
- Touching the Void · Joe Simpson
This book provides one of the primary and most detailed case studies Gonzales analyzes to illustrate the psychology of a survivor, including managing pain, using patterns, and the will to live.
- Adrift: Seventy-six Days Lost at Sea · Steven Callahan
Callahan's story serves as a textbook example of the ideal survivor mindset in action, demonstrating nearly all of the '12 Rules' Gonzales outlines, such as maintaining routine, finding beauty, and surrendering without giving up.
- All Quiet on the Western Front · Erich Maria Remarque
Gonzales quotes Remarque's novel to illustrate the development of instinctual, life-saving secondary emotions in soldiers, a key concept in how experience rewires the brain for survival.