Humans are bad at making decisions. According to some scientists, most decisions are based on oversimplification, laziness and prejudice.

Horizon presents a guide to better decision-making, revealing how choices can be confounded by temperature, warped by post-rationalisation and even manipulated by the future.

Mathematician Garth Sundem is convinced that conclusions can best be reached using simple maths and a pencil. So, he experiments with a group of single computer enthusiasts to see if maths can help them find love.

Dr Radin, one of the world’s leading researchers into psychic phenomena, believes “precognition” – the ability to tangibly sense what has yet to happen – plays a significant role in the decision-making processes. What’s more, he’s designed an experiment that appears to prove this effect.

Shana Sewell, a 32-year-old mother of two, is unable to make decisions. Following a brain haemorrhage in 2003, she lost the capacity for the kind of spontaneous and apparently trivial decision-making usually taken for granted. She’s unable to make a decision from deciding on which loaf of bread to buy, to whether to insist that her daughter revises for exams.

Rational thought and the ability to make informed decisions help define our species, yet indecision is commonplace.

In this programme, Horizon lifts the lid on the business of human choices and, in so doing, presents its exclusive guide to making better decisions.

Tuesday 12 February
9.00-10.00pm BBC TWO