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Elo comments on Open Thread, May 4 - May 10, 2015 - Less Wrong
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I noticed a thing that I do. When I rush; I have a tendency to do clumsier versions of actions I know really well. I have now trained myself to notice moments of rush, and purposefully "slow down to normal speed" on tasks to allow them to happen in the efficient most possible time.
Simple example, searching for a key in a bundle. Where rushing causes fumbling which takes longer, slowing down to "normal speed" makes the finding the right key happen sooner.
Is there a name for this process? Has anyone recorded it before? Is this a suggestion that other rationalists can practically take on to improve their "rushing to do things" process?
Second example; trying to cut food while under pressure. third example; trying to put on a shirt. fourth: (occasionally) typing passwords. 5th: trying to retrieve something from the bottom of a bag, (or otherwise pass an object through a small opening) 6th: running down stairs ... I think you get the idea.
TL;DR. Idea: notice when you "rush"; actively do things at "normal speed" to avoid mistakes because this gets things done faster.
I think this is a commonly known thing, and the common advice is to calm down and breathe deeply,
I am not talking about "big rush" situations; but rather "small rush" situations.
not sure where to find more about it. Surely a rational brain would have concluded the inefficiency and stopped doing "small rushing" (not that we are rational or anything - but maybe someone documented it before me)
Do you have a heuristic for differentiating big rushes from small rushes? I think any time you are trying to perform a task, and some epsilon greater than zero of your conscious capacity is focusing on the ticking clock, then that represents a deficit from maximal focus. I think the deep breathing advice is good for any rush.
https://intelligence.org/files/CognitiveBiases.pdf in part 8 has a note on time pressure increasing the effect of the affect heuristic, but it doesn't quite fit with what you are talking about (fumbling for keys).
"Slow is smooth, smooth is fast."
The following proverb comes to mind:
Another proverb: "More haste, less speed"
When I'm in a rush and I'm about to do something that requires carefulness, attention, and "normal speed" as you call it, I tell myself that, if my purpose is to get done with it as quickly as possible, I should deliberately slow down, because more often than not, botching up something and then fixing it takes significantly longer than doing it right at a normal speed.
I suppose it depends on the model of risk associated:
where the whole task might be a minute; taking another minute to fix things up is a 100% time increase. Where a task that might not be rushed; something that takes an hour; an extra minute won't be as big a change. so not as bad a change? (but this is something of a different effect)
I don't think speeding up processes is always bad. It's just not always an appropriate emotional response to the problem one faces.
Speeding up the typing of password makes sense when you know them well enough to make no errors.
It's often problematic when an uncomfortable emotion causes one to rush and one tries to rush to escape the uncomfortable emotion.
When it comes to task such as putting on clothing it's also useful to do them a few times in slow motion to allow the body do find better ways of doing them.
(I get my password wrong when I try to type it too fast, conversely I have made one spelling error when writing this sentence, I have probably typed this particular password upwards of 1000 times)