The present study investigated skilled and adaptive strategy selection in risky decision making. We proposed that people with high objective numeracy, a strong predictor of general decision making skill, would have a broad repertoire of choice strategies and adaptively select these strategies depending on the importance of the decision. Thus more objectively numerate people would maximize their effort (e.g., invest more time) in important, high-payoff decisions and switch to a simple, fast heuristic strategy in trivial decisions. Subjective numeracy would, by contrast, be more closely related to interest in problem solving for its own sake and would not yield such an effect of importance. Participants made twelve high-payoff choices and twelve low-payoff choices in binary two-outcome gambles framed as gains. We measured objective and subjective numeracy using standard measures. Results showed that people with high subjective numeracy generally maximized the expected value (EV) in all decisions. In contrast, participants with high objective numeracy maximized EV only when choice problems were meaningful (i.e., they could result in high payoffs). When choice problems were trivial (i.e., choosing the normatively better option would not result in a large payoff), more objectively numerate participants made choices consistent with faster, more frugal heuristic strategies.
In the digital world of today, multitasking with media is inevitable. Research shows, for instance, that American youths spend on average 7.5 h every day with media, and 29% of that time is spent processing different forms of media simultaneously (Uncapher et al., 2017). Despite numerous studies, however, there is no consensus on whether media multitasking is effective or not. In the current paper, we review existing literature and propose that in order to ascertain whether media multitasking is effective, it is important to determine (1) which goal/s are used as a reference point (e.g., acquiring new knowledge, obtaining the highest number of points in a task, being active on social media); (2) whether a person's intentions and subjective feelings or objective performance are considered (e.g., simultaneous media use might feel productive, yet objective performance might deteriorate); and finally (3) whether the short- or long-term consequences of media multitasking are considered (e.g., media multitasking might help attain one's present goals yet be conducive to a cognitive strategy that leads to lesser attentional shielding of goals). Depending on these differentiations, media multitasking can be seen as both a strategic behavior undertaken to accomplish one's goals and as a self-regulatory failure. The article integrates various findings from the areas of cognitive psychology, psychology of motivation, and human-computer interaction.
Expected utility theory posits that our preferences for gambles result from the weighting of utilities of monetary payoffs by their probabilities. However, recent studies have shown that combining payoffs and probabilities is often distorted by affective responses. In the current study, we hypothesized that affective response to a lottery prize moderates processing of payoffs and probabilities. Attentional engagement (measured by the number of fixations in the eye tracking experiment) was predicted by probability, value of an outcome, and their interaction, but only for affect-poor lottery tickets. A corresponding pattern of results was not observed in affect-rich lottery tickets, suggesting more simplified processing of such lotteries.Keywords affect, attention, decision-making, eye-tracking, probability StreszczenieDeskryptywne modele podejmowania decyzji (oparte na idei maksymalizacji oczekiwanej użyteczno-ści) przewidują, że indywidualne preferencje wobec ryzyka wynikają z użyteczności potencjalnych wy- płat pieniężnych oraz prawdopodobieństwa ich otrzymania. Na przykład, zgodnie z przewidywaniami skumulowanej teorii perspektywy decydent wybiera zakład o wyższej wartości iloczynu użyteczności konsekwencji (subiektywnej reprezentacji wypłat pieniężnych) i wag decyzyjnych (subiektywnej reprezentacji prawdopodobieństwa). Ostatnie badania wykazały jednak, że poznawcza ocena oraz integracja wypłat i prawdopodobieństwa jest często zniekształcana przez reakcje afektywne. W obecnym eksperymencie prosiliśmy osoby badane o zapoznanie się z loteriami, w których można było wygrać nagrody budzące różne reakcje afektywne. Jednocześnie dokonywany był pomiar ruchu gałek ocznych. Postawiliśmy hipotezę, wedle której afektywna reakcja wobec nagrody będzie moderowała przetwarzanie wypłat oraz ich prawdopodobieństw. Otrzymane rezultaty wskazują, że poziom zaangażowania uwagowego (mierzonego liczbą fiksacji wzroku) był przewidywany przez prawdopodobieństwo wygrania danej nagrody, jej wartość oraz interakcję tych czynników. Związki te zachodziły jednak tylko dla loterii, które nie wywoływały reakcji afektywnych. Podobnego wzorca wyników nie zaobserwowano w przypadku loterii silnie afektywnych, co sugeruje bardziej uproszczony proces przetwarzania takich problemów decyzyjnych. Wyniki naszego badania są kolejnym dowodem na to, że procesy decyzyjne i ocena ryzyka w dużym stopniu zależą od intensywności reakcji afektywnych. Słowa kluczoweemocje, uwaga, podejmowanie decyzji, eye-tracking, prawdopodobieństwo
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