From any psychologist's point of view, this book is full of contradicting psychological facts. Even as a general reader, I find this book says a lot of things but does not actually tell you what it actually wants to address.
But I love this book for totally different reasons. Firstly, I love case studies with interesting results written by someone who can write in a way you will find the whole experience exhilarating. Secondly, this guy deserves a five star because he is making less known but thought-provoking scientific studies to a much wider audience. Thirdly, nowhere it is mentioned in the title it is a book which teaches you how to think without thinking so it is completely understandable why it shows us both the advantages and disadvantages of snap decision making and it completely leaves to the reader to decide when to do what. Finally, I love non-fiction which uses a lot of anecdotes to state a fact rather just directly stating the fact it wants to address.
I recommend it to anyone who loves to read about interesting psychological studies.

Great book with great ideas
But I don't know why it took him so long to deliver them.
Too much details and unnecessary examples.

Gladwell continues his exploration of counter-intuitive ideas about decision-making in BLINK! He opens with a 1983 incident at the J. Paul Getty Museum. The Museum acquired a rare statue from the Greek archaic period. To this day, the Museum maintains that the authenticity of the statue is uncertain. At the time, however, the Museum was certain enough to acquire the piece for just under $10 million. Documentation, and scientific analysis had been relied on as support. However, numerous experts including Metropolitan Museum of Art director Thomas Hoving pronounced it a fake. It was an intuitive pronouncement which presaged problems later uncovered with both the documentation and scientific analysis. This is the first of many stories Gladwell uses to illustrate how an intuitive reaction can trump logic and analysis.

Among the factors that cloud logic is something he calls the adaptive unconscious. It's an unrecognized emotional bias. In the Getty example, the officials wanted the piece to be authentic. It would have been a spectacular acquisition for a newly established museum. This desire diverted critical scrutiny of the supporting evidence. Such an adaptation need not even be emotion based. In an explanation of priming, Gladwell cites psychological studies that illustrate the subconscious effect of pre-conditioning through word lists. Extrapolating from these examples, one might conclude that the casual reader will be highly influenced when reviewing a book by his mood or even surroundings at the time of reading.

Gladwell explores other impediments to logical thinking, logic being a type of perceptual filter. Face recognition, he points out, occurs in a completely different part of the brain, and is an integrated reaction as opposed to the kind of multi-step processing that occurs in dealing with language. Athletic and musical achievement rely on these non-verbal neural processes. His own example cites Paul Van Ripper's success against a team backed by the Pentagon's most sophisticated computers in a war games exercise. The Pentagon team was actually hampered in their decision making by information overload.

Initial reaction, Gladwell points out is not always accurate. He tries to explore this downside as well by citing studies on bias.

Gladwell is an entertaining storyteller as well as an energetic researcher. He draws examples from market research, Chancellorsville in the Civil War, the assessment of heart attacks at Cook County Hospital, speed dating, fire fighting, the auditioning of professional musicians, and the Diallo Incident in the Bronx to illustrate his points. By drawing from such a wide variety of experience, he insures the interest of a broad audience in this book.

NOTE: It's always fun to re-encounter characters from other books. I knew of Thomas Hoving from his book, KING OF THE CONFESSORS. The idea of thin-slice thinking was also explored in HOW WE DECIDE, by Jonah Lehrer. The deconstruction of flavor is discussed from a neurophysiological standpoint in Gordon Shepherd's NEUROGASTRONOMY.

Most people don’t know that I have a hidden science, psychology and history kink. Except you my Goodread buddies. What I love most about Gladwell is his books read like beautiful science journals and research papers. Enough background with great examples and a story that ties it all in. I love research and the Power of thinking so to have it broken down in such a fashion is eye opening.
My only complaint is it wasn’t long enough.

Happy reading everyone