Tuesday, August 19, 2025

Previous | Next

• People disregard advice when making tough decisions, study finds

• Amor Fati: Nick Orr speaks on his busy summer and the season ahead

• Waterloo and partners launch initiative to drive AI adoption across Canada

People disregard advice when making tough decisions, study finds

A news release from the Media Relations team.

An international study surveying people in a dozen countries found that when it comes to making complex decisions, people all over the world tend to reflect on their own, rather than seek advice.

Researchers from the University of Waterloo led the new study that surveyed more than 3,500 people from megacities to small Indigenous communities in the Amazon rainforest to learn how they make decisions. This work is the broadest test of decision-style preferences across cultures to date.

The researchers say understanding that even in interdependent societies most people prefer to go with the decision made by themselves irrespective of what others say can help clarify cross-cultural misunderstandings and show that we all appear to be juggling similar internal debates.

“Realizing that most of us instinctively ‘go it alone’ helps explain why we often ignore good counsel, be it for health tips or financial planning, despite mounting evidence that such counsel may help us make wiser decisions,” said Dr. Igor Grossmann, professor in the Department of Psychology at Waterloo and first author on the paper. “This knowledge can help us design teamwork better by working with this self-reliant tendency and letting employees reason privately before sharing advice that they might reject.”

The study upends the belief that westerners work things out themselves while the rest of the world leans on others. In fact, intuition and self-reflection beat out advice from friends or crowdsourcing in all countries studied. The amount of that preference varied, depending on the level at which a culture values independence or interdependence.

“Our take-home message is that we all look inward first, yet the wisest moves may happen when solo reflections are shared with others,” Grossmann said. “What culture does is controls the volume knob, dialing up that inner voice in highly independent societies and softening it somewhat in more interdependent ones.”

Nearly 40 authors contributed to this work as part of the Geography of Philosophy Project, which is led by Dr. Edouard Machery, from the University of Pittsburgh. 

The study, Decision-making preferences for intuition, deliberation, friends or crowds in independent and interdependent societies, appears in Proceedings of the Royal Society B Biological Sciences.

Amor Fati: Nick Orr speaks on his busy summer and the season ahead

Nick Orr prepares to take a snap vs Carleton. Photo credit: Steve Brooks.

By Sam Bellerose. This is an excerpt of an article that originally appeared on the Athletics and Recreation website.

Nick Orr hasn't stopped growing as an athlete since first arriving at the University of Waterloo in the fall of 2022. 

From winning the starting quarterback job as a true freshman, to being selected to play in the 2025 East-West Bowl on home turf in May, solidifying his place as one of the top CFL draft-eligible players in U SPORTS heading into this season, the Caledon, Ont. native has taken massive strides on and off the field in his time as a Warrior. 

And yet, Orr will tell you his evolution as a quarterback and as a leader is just beginning. 

"When I was younger, I used to go to camps and I just wanted to show off and impress," he said.  

For most players at this stage of their U SPORTS careers, that's precisely the goal. And Orr has had plenty of chances to impress CFL scouts and coaches this summer. The morning after the East-West Bowl game – in which he threw for 98 yards, a touchdown, and an interception while leading Team West with 54 yards on the ground – he arrived in Guelph for the Toronto Argonauts training camp, where he was invited to participate through the CFL QB Internship program. 

"I viewed Toronto as a learning experience, and I went in not trying to show that I have it all figured out." 

"They really let me do everything. I was in all the meetings. I took some reps in practice," he said. "My biggest take away was schematic awareness and Football IQ. It's such an advanced game in the CFL, and they were so good at showing me the ropes, showing me their plays, and how they conceptually view our plays." 

He's also been training this offseason with QB Movement's Myles Gibbon, who's helped develop pros including Warriors all-time great and current Edmonton Elk Tre Ford. Orr has spent time Finch QB training, run by former Western Mustangs great Will Finch, this summer as well. 

"I'm not trying to light it up and show them 'I can do this, I can do that,'" he said, "No, dude, I'm coming to you because you're an expert I want you to show me, tell me what I need to work on, because that's how you can take away the most from those experiences." 

This aligns with an overall shift in perspective for Orr, who has come to view the game and his love for competing differently. 

"You play it for fun as a kid, and then all of a sudden it gets serious and you have to market yourself. You have to get on the radar. You have to get recruited. You're battling."  

"I get here. I'm battling right away to start. And you don't really have a chance to kind of slow down and think of why you're doing it." 

"I used to want to play football for the tangible; I want to win 'x' amount of games. I want to win this championship. I want to throw for this many yards. But I've come to realize that the joy I get from football comes from the little moments in practice." 

Read the full story on the Athletics and Recreation website.

Waterloo and partners launch initiative to drive AI adoption across Canada

This article was originally published on the Economics department website.

The University of Waterloo, the Centre for International Governance Innovation, and the Centre for the Study of Living Standards have partnered to launch the Canadian AI Adoption Initiative (CAIAI). Co-directed by Joël Blit (UWaterloo) and Danielle Goldfarb (University of Toronto), CAIAI seeks to reverse Canada’s productivity decline and strengthen competitiveness by accelerating AI integration. 

“This initiative aligns with a growing government focus on AI adoption and will provide policymakers advice on best practices and support in developing the metrics that track country-wide adoption,” says Joël Blit, co-director of CAIAI, professor of Economics at the University of Waterloo and a senior fellow at the Centre for International Governance Innovation (CIGI).

The Initiative will focus on three main objectives:

• Develop ideas and policies to drive economy-wide AI adoption in Canada based on the best available evidence.
• Develop a set of adoption metrics to track Canada’s progress, expose barriers and guide action.
• Partner with government and other organizations to implement AI adoption initiatives and measure their impact.

Read more about the initiative through the University of Waterloo and learn more about the work and recommendations of the Institute directly from the Canadian AI Adoption Initiative.