Melbourne Decision Making Questionnaire

Mann, L., Burnett, P., Radford, M., & Ford, S. (1997). The Melbourne Decision Making Questionnaire: An instrument for measuring patterns for coping with decisional conflict. Journal of Behavioral Decision Making, 10(1), 1-19. doi:10.1002/(SICI)1099-0771(199703)10:1<1::AID-BDM242>3.0.CO;2-X
See also the Flinders Adolescent Decision Making Questionnaire.


 Table of Contents

Description

History of Use

References

Description:

Purpose
The Melbourne Decision Making Questionnaire was designed to assess how individuals approach decision situations. It was intended to be an improvement on Mann's (1982) Flinders Decision Making Questionnaire. It distinguishes between 4 approaches to decisions.
  • Vigilance involves a careful, unbiased, and thorough evaluation of alternatives and rational decision making.
  • Hypervigilance involves a hurried, anxious approach.
  • Procrastination involves delaying decisions.
  • Buck Passing involves leaving decisions to others and avoiding responsibility.
See also the Flinders Adolescent Decision Making Questionnaire.
Questions
22 items
Sub-scales
4 sub-scales:
  • Vigilance (V)
  • Hypervigilance (H)
  • Procrastination (P)
  • Buck Passing (B)
Domain

Psychometrics

Sample items
  • I like to consider all of the alternatives. (V)
  • Whenever I face a difficult decision I feel pessimistic about finding a good solution. (H)
  • I prefer to leave decisions to others. (B)
  • Even after I have made a decision I delay acting upon it. (P)

References:

Scale:
  • Mann, L. (1982). Flinders Decision Making Questionnaire II. Unpublished Questionnaire. The Flinders University of South Australia.
Uses:
  • Di Fabio, A. and D. L. Blustein (2010). "Emotional Intelligence and Decisional Conflict Styles Some Empirical Evidence Among Italian High School Students." Journal of Career Assessment 18(1): 71-81. doi:10.1177/1069072709350904 (Also uses Indecisiveness Scale)
  • Baker, J. R., Psych, M., & Phillips, J. G. (2007). E-mail, decisional styles, and rest breaks. Cyberpsychology & Behavior, 10(5), 705-708. doi:10.1089/cpb.2007.9966
  • Mann, L., Radford, M., Burnett, P., Ford, S., Bond, M., Leung, K., et al. (1998). Cross-cultural differences in self-reported decision-making style and confidence. International Journal of Psychology, 33(5), 325-335. doi:10.1080/002075998400213
  • Phillips, J. G., & Reddie, L. (2007). Decisional style and self-reported email use in the workplace. Computers in Human Behavior, 23(5), 2414-2428. doi:10.1016/j.chb.2006.03.016
  • Preston, S. D., Muroff, J. R., & Wengrovitz, S. M. (2009). Investigating the mechnisms of hoarding from an experimental perspective. Depression and Anxiety, 26(5), 425-437. doi:10.1002/da.20417


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