Helen Haste is Professor Emerita in Psychology at the University of Bath, UK, and was a Visiting Professor at Harvard Graduate School of Education 2003-2018 where she was director of the Harvard Graduate School of Education's Spencer Foundation-funded New Civics Early Career Scholars' Program which supported doctoral students whose research interests concern civic education and civic engagement. For five decades she has been working on young peoples’ moral, civic and political beliefs, identity and behaviour, including the educational, cultural and social factors which influence their development.  She has also worked on cultural factors in science and society, including how young people regard science and technology and how this influences their choices of study and career.  A strand in all this work has also been the role of gender and feminist theory.  Her research on civic and moral engagement and education includes questions about ethics, moral, social and civic understanding and the relationship between values, activism and citizenship. What promotes, and what inhibits, youth civic participation?  Her current work is on the implications of social change for education, ethics and competences.

Her work is based on a theory of culture and the individual that addresses language, rhetoric and metaphor. Her data sources are international, including the UK, China, South Africa and Europe.  Haste is the author or editor of eight books and over 200 scholarly papers. She was co-editor of the journal Political Psychology (2010-2015) and was President of the International Society of Political Psychology in 2002.  She has held a number of international visiting appointments including in China.

Haste is a recipient of two of the International Society of Political Psychology's career awards, the Sanford Award and the Knutson Award, and the Association for Moral Education's Kuhmerker Award for her lifetime contribution to the field of moral development. She is a Fellow of the British Academy of Social Science, the British Psychological Society and the Royal Society of Arts. She has been a frequent contributor to broadcasting and public media.

Abstract:

Future “is” and “ought” stories: Threats of Uncertainty, Seductions of Certainty

We predict the future badly, so we do not prepare for it well.  Recent global events have forced us to recognize radical uncertainty about the future.  They have revealed how we make less than rational decisions, and how we fail to use evidence well.  They have exposed how a deep fear of the unknown and the uncertain leads us to seek explanations and solutions that are simple and comforting – conspiracy theories being just one of these. How do we equip young people – and the experts of tomorrow – to be effective in an uncertain world?  How do we manage uncertainty and ambiguity productively and creatively?  How do we avoid the seduction of neat - but dangerously simplistic – solutions?  I will explore specific examples of recent failures of prediction due to limited models, cognitive bias and distortion that impair effective use of information, and ethical or political perspectives that skew judgment and perception in pursuit of their goals.  The purpose is to point up the ways in which both lay and scientific models of ‘future stories’, predictions and prescriptions are deeply flawed especially by the deep-rooted anxiety about, and therefore avoidance of, uncertainty.  The paper will argue that education must not only teach how to avoid flaws in information processing but also must equip people for managing, not fleeing, ambiguity and uncertainty.  The paper draws on the Author’s work over several decades on social movements and social change, ethics, and education for effective citizenship.