Satisficing is a decision-making strategy or cognitive heuristic that entails searching through the available alternatives until an acceptability threshold is met.[1] The term satisficing, a portmanteau of satisfy and suffice,[2] was introduced by Herbert A. Simon in 1956,[3] although the concept was first posted in his 1947 book Administrative Behavior.[4][5] Simon used satisficing to explain the behavior of decision makers under circumstances in which an optimal solution cannot be determined. He maintained that many natural problems are characterized by computational intractability or a lack of information, both of which preclude the use of mathematical optimization procedures. He observed in his Nobel Prize in Economics speech that "decision makers can satisfice either by finding optimum solutions for a simplified world, or by finding satisfactory solutions for a more realistic world. Neither approach, in general, dominates the other, and both have continued to co-exist in the world of management science".[6]
Simon formulated the concept within a novel approach to rationality, which posits that rational choice theory is an unrealistic description of human decision processes and calls for psychological realism. He referred to this approach as bounded rationality. Some consequentialist theories in moral philosophy use the concept of satisficing in the same sense, though most call for optimization instead.
In decision making, satisficing refers to the use of aspiration levels when choosing from different paths of action. By this account, decision-makers select the first option that meets a given need or select the option that seems to address most needs rather than the "optimal" solution.
Example: A task is to sew a patch onto a pair of blue pants. The best needle to do the threading is a 4-cm-long needle with a 3-millimeter eye. This needle is hidden in a haystack along with 1,000 other needles varying in size from 1 cm to 6 cm. Satisficing claims that the first needle that can sew on the patch is the one that should be used. Spending time searching for that one specific needle in the haystack is a waste of energy and resources.
A crucial determinant of a satisficing decision strategy concerns the construction of the aspiration level. In many circumstances, the individual may be uncertain about the aspiration level.
Example: An individual who only seeks a satisfactory retirement income may not know what level of wealth is required—given uncertainty about future prices—to ensure a satisfactory income. In this case, the individual can only evaluate outcomes on the basis of their probability of being satisfactory. If the individual chooses that outcome which has the maximum chance of being satisfactory, then this individual's behavior is theoretically indistinguishable from that of an optimizing individual under certain conditions.[7][8][9]
Another key issue concerns an evaluation of satisficing strategies. Although often regarded as an inferior decision strategy, specific satisficing strategies for inference have been shown to be ecologically rational, that is in particular decision environments, they can outperform alternative decision strategies.[10]
Satisficing also occurs in consensus building when the group looks towards a solution everyone can agree on even if it may not be the best.
Example: A group spends hours projecting the next fiscal year's budget. After hours of debating they eventually reach a consensus, only to have one person speak up and ask if the projections are correct. When the group becomes upset at the question, it is not because this person is wrong to ask, but rather because the group has already come up with a solution that works. The projection may not be what will actually come, but the majority agrees on one number and thus the projection is good enough to close the book on the budget.
One popular method for rationalizing satisficing is optimization when all costs, including the cost of the optimization calculations themselves and the cost of getting information for use in those calculations, are considered. As a result, the eventual choice is usually sub-optimal in regard to the main goal of the optimization, i.e., different from the optimum in the case that the costs of choosing are not taken into account.
Alternatively, satisficing can be considered to be just constraint satisfaction, the process of finding a solution satisfying a set of constraints, without concern for finding an optimum. Any such satisficing problem can be formulated as an (equivalent) optimization problem using the indicator function of the satisficing requirements as an objective function. More formally, if X denotes the set of all options and S ⊆ X denotes the set of "satisficing" options, then selecting a satisficing solution (an element of S) is equivalent to the following optimization problem
where Is denotes the Indicator function of S, that is
A solution s ∈ X to this optimization problem is optimal if, and only if, it is a satisficing option (an element of S). Thus, from a decision theory point of view, the distinction between "optimizing" and "satisficing" is essentially a stylistic issue (that can nevertheless be very important in certain applications) rather than a substantive issue. What is important to determine is what should be optimized and what should be satisficed. The following quote from Jan Odhnoff's 1965 paper is appropriate:[11]
In my opinion there is room for both 'optimizing' and 'satisficing' models in business economics. Unfortunately, the difference between 'optimizing' and 'satisficing' is often referred to as a difference in the quality of a certain choice. It is a triviality that an optimal result in an optimization can be an unsatisfactory result in a satisficing model. The best things would therefore be to avoid a general use of these two words.
In economics, satisficing is a behavior which attempts to achieve at least some minimum level of a particular variable, but which does not necessarily maximize its value.[12] The most common application of the concept in economics is in the behavioral theory of the firm, which, unlike traditional accounts, postulates that producers treat profit not as a goal to be maximized, but as a constraint. Under these theories, a critical level of profit must be achieved by firms; thereafter, priority is attached to the attainment of other goals.