I’ve always been interested in cognitive bias when it comes to the way we look at the world and how it changes your own Lebensraum. And if you apply that to how we deal with people and in particular on how we go about doing project management, we may come to very weird conclusions. The main question is: is project Management dependent on our own cognitive bias or is more about our powers of reasoning when doing project management (e.g., problem solving, etc.)?

The questions about "reasoning" are only simple arithmetic problems. Although all the book has to offer is that "psychology" is basically trying to explain semi-random decisions. Ones that can be hugely influenced by uncontrollable circumstances: like whether or not there is a "matriarchal juror across the table is speaking both frequently and sensibly" present. And even then, few (if any) experiments are reproducible and none produce any quantifiable data - nothing that can be measured as there are no instruments available, nor are there universally agreed definitions, objectively identifiable factors or any units of measure whatsoever. The subject (you can't call it a science) is close to where alchemy was, 1000 years ago. Some occasionally observed phenomena that have vague explanations at the macroscopic level but absolutely no idea of what goes on in detail, to cause them. Most of what I read of psychology, and indeed other social science, when applied to areas like politics, economics, project management or broadly to society or people in general, amounts to evidence for the obvious (e.g., everybody has some biases, two heads are better then one, etc) but near zero explanatory power beyond this (e.g., what views are more or less biased, how to judge this, what causes it, etc). When it comes to project Management, overconfidence almost leads to wrong project decisions. Anticipating more difficulty than appeared means analysing the challenges rather than jumping to what seems like the obvious answer.

I'm sure human emotions can be a valid subject of study when it comes to project management. But I don't think it can be made into a "scientific" psychological study. The brain mapping involved in neuroscience isn't psychology; it’s a scientific study of how the brain interacts and how it operates when humans feel certain emotional states. Thus is gets to the root of causal mechanisms in the brain which elicit emotional states. On the other hand, psychology is more concerned in examining second hand data. It usually starts with a theory and then someone tries to make it work through an empirical sample. I think this is what it makes it compatible and highly complementary with the ideologies you may find within political "science".

For when applied to project management, the science is in the method of exploration. As with all disciplines, some practitioners adhere to scientific principles and others do not (I'm thinking "PMBoK" here). There are project managers who do not, just as there are psychologists who do.

BTW emotions are real, they are part of human nature and thus a valid subject of scientific study. How the results are used is a different issue entirely. Benson's take on this offers nothing new.

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