Naturalistic Decision-Making (NDM) emerged opportunistically and not as a carefully planned movement.

Eight key factors combined to initiate the NDM movement, beginning with simple curiosity.

The continued success of the NDM movement is, in many ways, a surprise.

In late June 2026, we held the 18th Naturalistic Decision-Making (NDM) conference and celebrated the 40th anniversary of the movement. One question came up about how the NDM movement got started. Here are the eight causes that, in my opinion, contributed to the birth of NDM.

First, and perhaps most important, was simple curiosity. The original cohort of NDM researchers wondered how people could make good decisions under time pressure and uncertainty. They didn't worry about doing the right kind of research. They just wanted to satisfy their curiosity.

Second, the government agency primarily responsible for decision research, the Army Research Institute, had been funding the traditional........

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