Prof. Dr. Wolfgang Gaissmaier

Professor

Office D 512
Tel.: +49 7531 88-3024
Fax: +49 7531 88-5288
gaissmaier@uni-konstanz.de

Research interests

  • Judgment and decision making
  • Individual differences in decision making
  • Risk perception and communication
  • Memory-based decision making
  • Medical decision making
  • Ecological rationality
  • Models of heuristics

Professional experience

since 2014Full Professor of Social Psychology and Decision Sciences (W3), Department of Psychology, University of Konstanz, Germany
since 2014Adjunct Researcher, Center for Adaptive Behavior and Cognition, Max Planck Institute for Human Development, Berlin, Germany
2008–2014Chief Research Scientist, Harding Center for Risk Literacy, Max Planck Institute for Human Development, Berlin, Germany
2007Postdoctoral Fellow, Center for Adaptive Behavior and Cognition, Max Planck Institute for Human Development, Berlin, Germany
2003–2006Predoctoral Fellow, Center for Adaptive Behavior and Cognition, Max Planck Institute for Human Development, Berlin, Germany

Education

2013Habilitation in Psychology, University of Heidelberg, Germany
2007PhD in Psychology, Free University Berlin, Germany
2002Diploma in Psychology (equivalent to Master’s Degree), Free University Berlin, Germany

Honors and awards

2013Rising Star, Association for Psychological Science
2012Fellow, German Young Academy, Berlin-Brandenburg Academy of Sciences and Humanities & German Academy of Sciences Leopoldina
2009Dissertation prize (runner up), German Psychological Society, Section: General Psychology
2008Otto Hahn Medal for outstanding scientific achievements, Max Planck Society
2006New Investigator Award, Brunswik Society

Publications

Gaissmaier, W. (2011). Risk communication: Why we need understandable information. Way Ahead, 15, 10–12.

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Gaissmaier, W., & Gigerenzer, G. (2011). When misinformed patients try to make informed health decisions. In G. Gigerenzer & J. A. Muir Gray (Eds.), Better doctors, better patients, better decisions: Envisioning healthcare 2020 (pp. 29–43). Cambridge, MA: MIT Press.

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Marewski, J. N., Gaissmaier, W., Schooler, L. J., Goldstein, D. G., & Gigerenzer, G. (2010). From recognition to decisions: Extending and testing recognition-based models for multialternative inference. Psychonomic Bulletin & Review, 17, 287–309.

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Marewski, J. N., Gaissmaier, W., & Gigerenzer, G. (2010). Good judgments do not require complex cognition. Cognitive Processing, 11, 103–121.

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Heesen, C., Kleiter, I., Nguyen, F., Schäffler, N., Kasper, J., Köpke, S., & Gaissmaier, W. (2010). Risk perception in natalizumab-treated multiple sclerosis patients and their neurologists. Multiple Sclerosis, 16, 1507–1512.

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Marewski, J. N., Gaissmaier, W., & Gigerenzer, G. (2010). We favor formal models of heuristics rather than lists of loose dichotomies: A reply to Evans and Over. Cognitive Processing, 11, 177–179.

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Marewski, J. N., Gaissmaier, W., Schooler, L. J., Goldstein, D. G., & Gigerenzer, G. (2009). Do voters use episodic knowledge to rely on recognition? In N. A. Taatgen & H. van Rijn (Eds.), Proceedings of the 31st Annual Conference of the Cognitive Science Society (pp. 2232–2237). Austin, TX: Cognitive Science Society.

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Gigerenzer, G., Gaissmaier, W., Kurz-Milcke, E., Schwartz, L. M., & Woloshin, S. (2009). Glaub keiner Statistik, die du nicht verstanden hast. Gehirn & Geist, (10), 34–39.

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Gigerenzer, G., Gaissmaier, W., Kurz-Milcke, E., Schwartz, L. M., & Woloshin, S. (2009). Knowing Your Chances. Scientific American Mind, 20(2), 45-51

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Gaissmaier, W. (2009). Kommunikation von Chancen und Risiken in der Medizin. In T. Langer & M. Schnell (Eds.), Das Arzt-Patient Patient-Arzt Gespräch: Ein Leitfaden für Klinik und Praxis (pp. 177–185). München: Marseille.

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Gaissmaier, W., & Gigerenzer, G. (2009). Risk communication. In M. W. Kattan (Ed.), Encyclopedia of medical decision making (Vol. 2, pp. 1006–1008). Los Angeles: Sage.

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Neumeyer-Gromen, A., & Gaissmaier, W. (2009). Screening programs. In M. W. Kattan (Ed.), Encyclopedia of medical decision making (Vol. 2, pp. 1020–1024). Los Angeles: Sage.

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Wegwarth, O., Gaissmaier, W., & Gigerenzer, G. (2009). Smart strategies for doctors and doctors-in-training: Heuristics in medicine. Medical Education, 43, 721–728.

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Gigerenzer, G., & Gaissmaier, W. (2009). Warum wir verständliche Informationen brauchen. Berliner Ärzte, 46(5), 3.

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Gaissmaier, W., Schooler, L. J., & Mata, R. (2008). An ecological perspective to cognitive limits: Modeling environment-mind interactions with ACT-R. Judgment and Decision Making, 3, 278–291.

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Gaissmaier, W., & Gigerenzer, G. (2008). Statistical illiteracy undermines informed shared decision making. Zeitschrift für Evidenz, Fortbildung und Qualität im Gesundheitswesen, 102, 411–413.

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Gaissmaier, W., & Schooler, L. J. (2008). The smart potential behind probability matching. Cognition, 109, 416–422.

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Gaissmaier, W., Straubinger, N., & Funder, D. C. (2007). Ecologically structured information: The power of pictures and other effective data presentations. Behavioral and Brain Sciences, 30, 263–264.

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Gigerenzer, G., Gaissmaier, W., Kurz-Milcke, E., Schwartz, L. M., & Woloshin, S. (2007). Helping doctors and patients make sense of health statistics. Psychological Science in the Public Interest, 8, 53–96.

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Bröder, A., &Gaissmaier, W. (2007). Sequential processing of cues in memory-based multiattribute decisions. Psychonomic Bulletin & Review, 14, 895-900.
(Reprinted in Heuristics: The foundations of adaptive behavior, pp. 429–435, by G. Gigerenzer, R. Hertwig, & T. Pachur, Eds., 2011, New York: Oxford University Press)

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