The path to least resistance: Using easy-toaccess information

ABSTRACT—Recent work on judgment and decisionmaking has focused onhowpeople preferentially use cues, or pieces of relevant information, that are easy to access when making decisions. In this article, we discuss a framework for understanding the ways that cues become accessible. We begin by identifying two components of cues and show how these components can become accessible during different parts a decision process. We highlight evidence for the use of accessible information and discuss implica-tions for future research on heuristics. KEYWORDS—judgment; decision making; fluency; cue weighting; effort reduction Making optimal decisions can be thought of as a complex process that requires many cognitive operations to be performed. With various demands on our time and attention, we often try to reduce the amount of effort that we expend on making judgments and decisions. These strategies for reducing effort are called heu