TOP DRAWER BOOK REVIEW
by
HL Carpenter

 

Blink
by Malcolm Gladwell
ISBN 0-316-17232-4
277 pages; hardcover; $25.95
Little, Brown and Company, New York, 2005

This book was ranked #5 on the Wall Street Journal's Best Selling Books list the week it was reviewed.

What's one thing a first date and a job interview have in common? In each case, you make - and form - an impression within a time span approximately the length of a blink. In addition, whether you acknowledge your initial conclusion or not, you'll base future decisions on it.

Given such high stakes, you might wonder whether your immediate response is accurate. Can you rely on what author Malcolm Gladwell calls the power of knowing? The answer is yes – and no.

To figure out the reason for the ambiguity, Mr. Gladwell dissects what happens during that initial blink of time. It turns out your instant judgment is based on past experience and unconscious prejudice. Much of the time you may be unaware of the process behind it or the factors influencing it.

Nonetheless, what seems to be an inexplicable instinctive reaction can be refined with training and practice. For instance, you can learn to identify micro-expressions, which are subtle changes in a person's face that you might not consciously be able to see. Once you've cued your subconscious to notice them, you can more easily match visual clues with verbal ones, and your first impressions become more precise and useful.

Making a snap judgment may not fit your idea of sound decision-making. But research shows you're going to do it anyway. So why not put this natural response to work for you? Better decisions could be just a blink away.

 

Review originally published July 2006.