This volume pulls together and republishes, with some editing, updating, and additions, articles written during 1978-86 for internal use within the CIA Directorate of Intelligence. The information is relatively timeless and still relevant to the never-ending quest for better analysis. The articles are based on reviewing cognitive psychology literature concerning how people process information to make judgments on incomplete and ambiguous information. Richard Heur has selected the experiments and findings that seem most relevant to intelligence analysis and most in need of communication to intelligence analysts. He then translates the technical reports into language that intelligence analysts can understand and interpreted the relevance of these findings to the problems intelligence analysts face. 305F PROFESSIONAL READING LIST.

pt. I. Our mental machinery. ch. 1. Thinking about thinking -- ch. 2. Perception : why can't we see what is there to be seen? -- ch. 3. Memory : how do we remember what we know? -- pt. II. Tools for thinking. ch. 4. Strategies for analytical judgement : transcending the limits of incomplete information -- ch. 5. Do you really need more information? -- ch. 6. Keeping an open mind -- ch. 7. Structuring analytical problems -- ch. 8. Analysis of competing hypotheses -- pt. III. Cognitive biases. ch. 9. What are cognitive biases? -- ch. 10. Biases in evaluation of evidence -- ch. 11. Biases in perception of cause and effect -- ch. 12. Biases in estimating probabilities -- ch. 13. Hindsight biases in evaluation of intelligence reporting -- pt. IV. Conclusions. ch. 14. Improving intelligence analysis.