What effect does use of automatic versus controlled thinking have on the quality of our reasoning? Overall, how good are people as social thinkers?

What will be an ideal response?

Answer: Both automatic and controlled thinking are likely to lead to reasonably correct answers for the most part. In automatic thinking, people use simpler strategies; in controlled thinking, people use more sophisticated reasoning and are more likely to notice when facts conflict with their existing schemas. Thus people are more likely to be accurate when they use controlled rather than automatic thinking. However, controlled thinking is not a cure-all for faulty reasoning; people can still make errors because they are overly anxious and thus unable to process information efficiently, because their assumptions are faulty, or because they do not know how to reason correctly despite their desire to do so. Thus both kinds of thinking can also lead to consequential errors.