In this article the authors develop a descriptive theory of choice using anticipated emotions. People are assumed to anticipate how they will feel about the outcomes of decisions and use their predictions to guide choice. The authors measure the pleasure associated with monetary outcomes of gambles and offer an account of judged pleasure called decision affect theory. Then they propose a theory of choices between gambles based on anticipated pleasure. People are assumed to choose the option with greater subjective expected pleasure. Similarities and differences between subjective expected pleasure theory and subjective expected utility theory are discussed. Emotions have powerful effects on choice. Our actual feelings of happiness, sadness, and anger both color and shape our decisions. In addition, our imagined feelings of guilt, elation, or regret influence our decisions. In this article we refer to these two influences as experienced emotions and anticipated emotions. Experienced emotions affect many levels of cognitive processing.

How do people feel about the outcomes of risky options? Results from two experiments demonstrate that the emotional reaction to a monetary outcome is not a simple function of the utility of that outcome Emotional responses also depend on probabilities and unobtained outcomes Unexpected outcomes have greater emotional impact than expected outcomes Furthermore any given outcome is less pleasant if an unobtained outcome is better We propose an account of emotional experiences associated with outcomes of decisions called decision affect theory It incorporates utilities expectations and counterfactual comparisons into hedonic responses Finally we show that choices between risky options can be described as the maximization of expected emotional experiences as predicted by decision affect theory That is people choose the risky option for which they expect to feel better on average

When making decisions, people often anticipate the emotions they might experience as a result of the outcomes of their choices. In the process, they simulate what life would be like with one outcome or another. We examine the anticipated and actual pleasure of outcomes and their relation to choices people make in laboratory studies and real-world studies. We offer a theory of anticipated pleasure that explains why the same outcome can lead to a wide range of emotional experiences. Finally, we show how anticipated pleasure relates to risky choice within the framework of subjective expected pleasure theory.

Most economists define rationality in terms of

The authors reanalyzed data from 2 influential studies-A. R. McConnell and J. M. Leibold (2001) and J. C. Ziegert and P. J. Hanges (2005)-that explore links between implicit bias and discriminatory behavior and that have been invoked to support strong claims about the predictive validity of the Implicit Association Test. In both of these studies, the inclusion of race Implicit Association Test scores in regression models reduced prediction errors by only tiny amounts, and Implicit Association Test scores did not permit prediction of individual-level behaviors. Furthermore, the results were not robust when the impact of rater reliability, statistical specifications, and/or outliers were taken into account, and reanalysis of A. R. McConnell & J. M. Leibold (2001) revealed a pattern of behavior consistent with a pro-Black behavioral bias, rather than the anti-Black bias suggested in the original study.Keywords: Implicit Association Test, predictive validity, discrimination, implicit biasThe Implicit Association Test (IAT; Greenwald, McGhee & Schwartz, 1998) has become one of psychology's most popular exports to the wider social sciences and the law (e.g., Lane, Kang, & Banaji, 2007). The measure's popularity is easy to grasp: IAT researchers often inform test takers they harbor implicit or unconscious biases toward minorities that many test takers disavow at a conscious level (Dasgupta, Greenwald, & Banaji, 2003). According to the much-visited Project Implicit Web site, without constant vigilance these implicit biases may lead to unwanted behaviors:People who hold egalitarian conscious attitudes in the face of automatic White preferences may [be] able to function in nonprejudiced fashion partly by making active efforts to prevent their automatic White preference from producing discriminatory behavior. However, when they relax these active efforts, these nonprejudiced people may be likely to show discrimination in thought or behavior. (IAT Corporation, n.d., Question 16) It is this claimed connection between implicit attitudes and discrimination that can make IAT feedback particularly disturbing to test takers. It also is the feature that makes research on the IAT of broad interdisciplinary interest. If the race IAT reliably predicts discriminatory behavior that cannot be consciously controlled, then society should take note. As but one example, the great majority of White Americans who have taken the IAT have been classified as anti-Black. This then points to an epidemic, either of unconscious racism (Greenwald & Krieger, 2006) or of falsepositive accusations of unconscious racism (Mitchell & Tetlock, 2006).Given the importance of the link between IAT scores and behavior, one might expect to find a large body of data establishing this connection-indeed, Greenwald and Krieger (2006, p. 961) described the evidence that implicit bias leads to discriminatory behavior as "already substantial." In fact, researchers in only a few studies have examined the ability of the IAT to predict behavior of any type, and resear...

Five university-based research groups competed to recruit forecasters, elicit their predictions, and aggregate those predictions to assign the most accurate probabilities to events in a 2-year geopolitical forecasting tournament. Our group tested and found support for three psychological drivers of accuracy: training, teaming, and tracking. Probability training corrected cognitive biases, encouraged forecasters to use reference classes, and provided forecasters with heuristics, such as averaging when multiple estimates were available. Teaming allowed forecasters to share information and discuss the rationales behind their beliefs. Tracking placed the highest performers (top 2% from Year 1) in elite teams that worked together. Results showed that probability training, team collaboration, and tracking improved both calibration and resolution. Forecasting is often viewed as a statistical problem, but forecasts can be improved with behavioral interventions. Training, teaming, and tracking are psychological interventions that dramatically increased the accuracy of forecasts. Statistical algorithms (reported elsewhere) improved the accuracy of the aggregation. Putting both statistics and psychology to work produced the best forecasts 2 years in a row.

The present article offers an approach to scientific debate called adversarial collaboration. The approach requires both parties to agree on empirical tests for resolving a dispute and to conduct these tests with the help of an arbiter. In dispute were Hertwig's claims that frequency formats eliminate conjunction effects and that the conjunction effects previously reported by Kahneman and Tversky occurred because some participants interpreted the word "and" in "bank tellers and feminists" as a union operator. Hertwig proposed two new conjunction phrases, "and are" and "who are," that would eliminate the ambiguity. Kahneman disagreed with Hertwig's predictions for "and are," but agreed with his predictions for "who are." Mellers served as arbiter. Frequency formats by themselves did not eliminate conjunction effects with any of the phrases, but when filler items were removed, conjunction effects disappeared with Hertwig's phrases. Kahneman and Hertwig offer different interpretations of the findings. We discuss the benefits of adversarial collaboration over replies and rejoinders, and present a suggested protocol for adversarial collaboration.

Although pleasure played a central role in early theories of decision making, it gradually became peripheral, largely because of measurement concerns. Normative theories became more mathematical, and descriptive theories emphasized cognition over emotion. In recent years, there has been a renewed interest in emotions and choice. This article examines attempts to model pleasure and pain in terms of utilities, decision weights, and counterfactual comparisons. Research on disappointment and regret has provided both empirical and theoretical insights. Many researchers now realize that the predictability of the emotions that follow from decisions is as important as the predictability of choice.