Handout 3.1: Nine Ways to Tap Your Intuition

1. For "old sayings," assumptions/predictions made in songs, assumptions made in classic or popular literature, assumptions made by experts ask:
   
   1. Is it true?
   2. Is there anything I know that seems to contradict that?
   3. When isn't it true? When is it more likely to be true?
   4. Is it true only in moderation?
   5. Why is it true (what is the cause-effect relationship or
   6. what is the mediating variable?)
   7. Why do people believe it's true?
2. Collect data on your own behavior, try to find rules that govern your behavior, and then see if those rules apply to other people.
3. Transform an argument into a research idea.
4. Look through a dictionary for interesting research variables.
5. Ask six key questions about any interesting phenomenon:
   1. Who does the behavior? How do people who are high and low on the behavior differ?
   2. What precisely is the behavior?
   3. When is the behavior most likely to occur? What events
   4. occur before the behavior?
   5. Why do people engage in the behavior?
   6. What are the long- and short-term effects of the behavior?
   
   
6. Figure out why bad/irrational actions occur.
7. Attack a practical problem (ecology, illiteracy, prejudice, apathy, alcoholism, violence).
8. Try to explain survey results.
   
9. Investigate factors that decrease your creativity.

Go to a list of old sayings

Go to a list of thought provoking facts.

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