We design an induced value choice experiment where the objects are valued according to only a single attribute with a continuous measure. Subjects have an imperfect perception of the choice objects but can reduce their imperfect perception with cognitive e¤ort. Subjects are given a choice set involving several lines of various lengths and are told to select one of them. They strive to select the longest line because they are paid an amount that is increasing in the length of their selection. This "idealized" choice experiment produces a dataset that is uniquely suited to study apparently random choice. We also manipulate the available cognitive resources of the subjects by imposing either a high or low cognitive load. We …nd that both choices and the allocation of e¤ort are a¤ected by the material incentives in the choice problem and the available cognitive resources. We …nd evidence that optimal choices have shorter deliberation times than suboptimal choices, which is consistent with previous theoretical predictions. The distribution of errors can have signi…cant implications for the speci…cation of stochastic choice models. Speci…cations where errors have a Gumbel distribution appear to provide a better …t than those with a normal distribution. Despite that the cognitive load manipulation a¤ects both choice and search, it is notable that neither the Gumbel distribution results nor the relationship between optimal choice and deliberation time appear to be a¤ected by the available cognitive resources. This perhaps suggests that these results are general and persistent features of choice.
We design a choice experiment where the objects are valued according to only a single attribute with a continuous measure and we can observe the true preferences of subjects. However, subjects have an imperfect perception of their own preferences. Subjects are given a choice set involving several lines of various lengths and are told to select one of them. They strive to select the longest line because they are paid an amount that is increasing in the length of their selection. Subjects also make their choices while they are required to remember either a 6-digit number (high cognitive load) or a 1-digit number (low cognitive load). We …nd that subjects in the high load treatment make inferior line selections and perform worse searches. When we restrict attention to the set of viewed lines, we …nd evidence that subjects in the high load treatment make worse choices than subjects in the low load treatment. Therefore the low quality searches do not fully explain the low quality choices. Our results suggest that cognition a¤ects choice, even in our idealized choice setting. We also …nd evidence of choice overload even when the choice set is small and the objects are simple. Further, our experimental design permits a multinomial discrete choice analysis on choice among single-attribute objects with an objective value. The results of our analysis suggest that the errors in our data are better described as having a Gumbel distribution rather than a normal distribution. Finally, we observe the e¤ects of limited cognition, consistent with memory decay and attention.
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