scenario analysis

a process in which managers conceptualize a range of plausible, logically consistent situations (scenarios) that may arise in the future and attempt to identify the implications of these for their organization and its activities. The purpose is not so much to predict the future—some of the scenarios considered may be highly unlikely—as to promote better decision making, better personnel use, and critical scrutiny of existing systems and processes, especially in terms of their ability to respond flexibly to unexpected negative events. Scenario analysis has important applications in such fields as politics, military strategy, business, ergonomics, and accident prevention.

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Psychology term of the day

February 25th 2025

ritualization

n. the process by which a normal behavioral action becomes a communication signal representing the behavior or its physiological consequence. For example, among nonhuman animals, threat displays may be the ritualization of the conflict between attack and escape, incorporating aspects of both, or a ritualization solely of impending attack, as when dogs pull back their lips in a snarl in response to a threat. This lip-pulling began as a way for dogs to avoid biting themselves in an attack, but as other animals recognized this behavior as a precursor to biting, it became ritualized into a warning communication. Animals learn that ritualized behavior can be an effective form of avoiding a fight.