Pval

It could be argued that human beings are rational, make continual inferences and then apply them; however, as it is revealed through the Pval app, neither people nor economic agents or entrepreneurs always behave in a particularly rational way in everyday life.

In the context of reasoning, we ideally look for a situation in which basically all the necessary information is available, everything relevant is known and then the laws of logic can be applied to reach the best conclusion, or the only one in some cases. The process of decision making, unlike strict logical reasoning, is characterized fundamentally by not having all the relevant information. Given the insufficiency and ineffectiveness of a simple logical instrumentation, it becomes necessary, from a probabilistic perspective, an intervention of a heuristic type; This is the main characteristic of the differences between logical reasoning and decision making.

Traditionally speaking, there are at least two kinds of reasoning: a type called inductive, in which conclusions are generalized from the observed cases; and deductive reasoning, in which a conclusion is derived from a set of premises. These types of reasoning are not specific to psychology, economics or any other field of knowledge; they are generic processes that apply both in mathematics and philosophy, or in any other field where anyone try to think and make inferences based on logic.

Thus, in the inductive reasoning, instances of experience are generalized until they are configured in provisional reasoning rules. Several cases are considered, samples of previous experience, which are generalized until reaching a conclusion. It can be said that these conclusions can usually be plausible and even probable, but do not necessarily have to be true; there could be exceptions to our experiences or, even if there were no such exceptions, basically the generalization could be revealed as arbitrary. In everyday life virtually all our reasoning is inductive.

The analysis of consistency can be simplified if it is possible to elaborate some type of index that takes into account the degree of deviation between the heuristic decisions and those that the policy maker could consider optimal. The Pval app is designed to facilitate this task. Taking as a guide the formal principles of modus tollens, the application coined an index of consistency that is built based on the degrees of importance that are conferred to a set of policies to promote entrepreneurship, previously screened by a set of basic criteria that they must comply. For the individual who solves the Pval survey through the app, the process is transparent. This avoids biases due to the prejudice of the base rate and other types of anomalies. Thus, in a simple way, the target population collaborates in the construction of a research database by filling in the questionnaire reagents. The simplicity of the method is illustrated by the following screens: