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Concept
Satisficing
Summary
Satisficing is a decision-making strategy or cognitive heuristic that entails searching through the available alternatives until an acceptability threshold is met. The term satisficing, a portmanteau of satisfy and suffice, was introduced by Herbert A. Simon in 1956, although the concept was first posited in his 1947 book Administrative Behavior. Simon used satisficing to explain the behavior of decision makers under circumstances in which an optimal solution cannot be determined. He maintained that many natural problems are characterized by computational intractability or a lack of information, both of which preclude the use of mathematical optimization procedures. He observed in his Nobel Prize in Economics speech that "decision makers can satisfice either by finding optimum solutions for a simplified world, or by finding satisfactory solutions for a more realistic world. Neither approach, in general, dominates the other, and both have continued to co-exist in the world of management science".
Simon formulated the concept within a novel approach to rationality, which posits that rational choice theory is an unrealistic description of human decision processes and calls for psychological realism. He referred to this approach as bounded rationality. Some consequentialist theories in moral philosophy use the concept of satisficing in the same sense, though most call for optimization instead.
In decision making, satisficing refers to the use of aspiration levels when choosing from different paths of action. By this account, decision-makers select the first option that meets a given need or select the option that seems to address most needs rather than the "optimal" solution.
Example: A task is to sew a patch onto a pair of blue pants. The best needle to do the threading is a 4-cm-long needle with a 3-millimeter eye. This needle is hidden in a haystack along with 1,000 other needles varying in size from 1 cm to 6 cm. Satisficing claims that the first needle that can sew on the patch is the one that should be used.
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