The Preference of the Use of Intuition over Other Methods of Problem Solving by Undergraduate Students

Abstract

: Intuition is one of the main factors that drive our everyday decision-making which happens quickly and unconsciously. Individuals often rely on the use of intuition to solve either simple or complex problems. The purpose of this research study is to further break down an individual’s thinking processes by understanding how different groups of individuals utilize intuition to make effective decisions. Major, gender, college year of classification, and ethnicity were the main factors analyzed in the study to identify if these factors have a significant impact on the use of each intuition type. The data collected from a survey distributed to undergraduate students at Purdue University (n=1109) was used to build a regression model for each intuition type: inferential (p = 3.524x10 −11 ), affective (p = 2.200x10 −16 ), holistic big picture (p = 1.755x10 −4 ), and holistic abstract (p = 3.195x10 −7 ). The results showed that inferential intuition was influenced by gender and ethnicity, while all four studied factors major, gender, ethnicity, and college year of classification have an impact on affective intuition. The holistic big-picture intuition model indicated that only gender and college influenced the use of this intuition type. In addition, gender, major, and ethnicity were the main drivers for holistic abstract intuition usage. The study suggests that intuition usage is driven by all four factors with gender as the main factor that have an impact on all four of the types of intuition. These findings provide a deeper insight into the main factors that influence the use of intuition. Abstract The model selected for holistic abstract intuition is composed of college, gender, and ethnicity. These three variables are the only ones that contribute to the use of holistic abstract. There were no interaction terms between factors that contribute to the use of holistic abstract intuition. The p-value of the model was 3.195x10 -7 < 𝛼 = 0.05 which gives us confidence that our model explains well the data collected and the relationship between variables. The intercept was 3.59814 (p-value = 2x10 -16 < 𝛼 = 0.05). The following table breaks down each of the coefficient estimates for the holistic abstract intuition model.