Does gist drive NASA experts’ design decisions?

As engineers retire from practice, they must transfer their expertise to new recruits. Typically, this is accomplished using decision‐support systems that communicate precise probabilities. However, Fuzzy‐Trace Theory (FTT) predicts that the most experts prefer to rely on “gist” representations of risk over “verbatim” representations. We conducted a survey of 41 NASA employees (whose mathematical abilities are a prerequisite for their jobs) and 233 nonexperts. We tested whether experts designing space missions under the micrometeoroid and orbital debris (MMOD) impact – rely more on qualitative or quantitative risk representations. We tested three hypotheses: gist and verbatim representations of MMOD risk are distinct for both experts and nonexperts; gist representations are more predictive of decisions than are verbatim representations; and providing nonexperts with a bottom‐line meaning change their gists more than verbatim information does. Results support FTT's predictions: gist and verbatim representations were distinct, and gist representations were associated with decisions for both experts and nonexperts. We did not observe an association between quantitative risk estimates and decisions for either experts or nonexperts. We observed that exposing a nonexpert to an expert's gist modified that nonexpert's gist yet exposing quantitative risk information did not. Implications for expertise transfer are discussed.