Weighing Outcomes <i>by</i> Time or <i>Against</i> Time? Evaluation Rules in Intertemporal Choice

Scholten, Marc; Read, Daniel; Sanborn, Adam N.

doi:10.1111/cogs.12104

Cited by 58 publications

(115 citation statements)

References 68 publications

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“…We need to design future experimental stimuli specifically for discriminating among these models to better understand the relative success of discounting and similarity models. Scholten, Read, and Sanborn () designed their studies to discriminate among several discounting models and their tradeoff model, with time‐weighting and value functions included for both model types. The attribute‐based tradeoff model outperformed the Loewenstein and Prelec () hyperbolic model.…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Intertemporal Similarity: Discounting as a Last Resort

Stevens

2015

Behavioral Decision Making

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Standard models of intertemporal choice assume that individuals discount future payoffs by integrating reward amounts and time delays to generate a discounted value. Alternative models propose that, rather than integrate across them, individuals compare within attributes (amounts and delays) to determine if differences in one attribute outweigh differences in another attribute. For instance, Leland (2002) and Rubinstein (2003) propose models that 1) compare the two reward amounts to determine whether they are similar, 2) compare the similarity of the two time delays, and then 3) make a decision based on these similarity judgments. Here, I tested discounting models against attribute-based models that use similarity judgments to make choices. I collected intertemporal choices and similarity judgments for the reward amounts and time delays from participants in three experiments. All experiments tested the ability of discounting and similarity models to predict intertemporal choices. Model generalization analyses showed that the best predicting models started with similarity judgments and then, if similarity failed to make a prediction, resorted to discounting models. Similarity judgments also matched intertemporal choice data demonstrating both the magnitude and sign effects, thereby accounting for behavioral data that contradict many discounting models. These results highlight the possibility that attribute-based models such as the similarity models provide alternatives to discounting that may offer insights into the process of making intertemporal choices.Word count: 8531

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Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Intertemporal Similarity: Discounting as a Last Resort

Stevens

2015

Behavioral Decision Making

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“…The choice items presented in Studies 2-5 were subsets of the 42 depicted in Table 3. In Study 2, we used the 27 choice items devised by Kirby et al (1999), and which have been widely used in studies of delay-discounting (e.g., Chabris et al 2008, Luo et al 2011, Myerson et al 2014, Scholten et al 2014, Torres et al 2013. These "Kirby" items (presented in the bottom half of Table 3) involve larger payoffs than the "Magen" items (top half of Table 3) and were originally developed to test the magnitude effect-the tendency for patience to increase as both the SS and LL payoffs are increased by a common multiplicative constant.…”

Section: Studies 2-5mentioning

confidence: 99%

The Value of Nothing: Asymmetric Attention to Opportunity Costs Drives Intertemporal Decision Making

2017

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T his paper proposes a novel account of impatience: People pay more attention to the opportunity costs of choosing larger, later rewards than to the opportunity costs of choosing smaller, sooner ones. Eight studies show that when the opportunity costs of choosing smaller, sooner rewards are subtly highlighted, people become more patient, whereas when the opportunity costs of choosing larger, later rewards are highlighted this has no effect. This pattern is robust to variations in the choice task, to the participant population, and to whether the choices are incentivized or hypothetical. We argue that people are naturally aware of the opportunity costs of delayed rewards but pay less attention to those associated with smaller, sooner ones. We conclude by discussing implications for theory and policy.Data, as supplemental material, are available at https://doi

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“…A general choice task presents participants with the choice of selecting a smaller, but not immediate, delayed amount, and a larger, more delayed amount (Scholten & Read, 2010;Scholten et al, 2014;Dai & Busemeyer, 2014). As discussed in Scholten and Read (2010) and Scholten et al (2014), this task results in choices that have challenged the hyperbolic model, a model that is almost conceived as a law of discounting behavior. Thus, there is the need for studying intertemporal decisions with other paradigms and assessing the generalizability of known findings.…”

Section: Methodsmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Intertemporal choices have been found to relate to important life outcomes such as academic performance (Kirby, Winston, & Santiesteban, ), credit‐worthiness (Meier & Sprenger, ), and social cooperation (Espín, Brañas‐Garza, Herrmann, & Gamella, ), to name a few. Recent interest in this topic has resulted in further development and testing of mathematical models (Scholten, Read, & Sanborn, ; Dai & Busemeyer, ; Cheng & González‐Vallejo, 2014; Ericson, White, Laibson, & Cohen, ). Yet, the psychological states (or psychological experiences) underlying these choices remain largely unstudied.…”

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confidence: 99%

Action Dynamics in Intertemporal Choice Reveal Different Facets of Decision Process

Cheng

González‐Vallejo

2015

Behavioral Decision Making

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Two experiments were conducted to examine decision process in intertemporal choice with spatial and temporal action dynamic measures generated from cursor movement. The effects of the context valence (gain and loss) and magnitude of the payoffs (small and large) were investigated. Other factors examined were differences between decisions made at versus away from the indifference point and response variability dependent on what was selected (delayed versus non‐delayed/less‐delayed payoff). Using principal components analysis, decision process is described with three orthogonal components. General decision difficulty is encompassed by two components: (1) Conflict, depicted by Idle time and deviations from a direct choice path, and (2) decision uncertainty or Wavering, described by left‐right directional flips. A general Locomotion factor was also present. In Experiment 1, Conflict was best at capturing the gain/loss and magnitude context effects. Greater Conflict was observed in the loss context and the small magnitude condition. When choices were closer to the indifference point, Wavering was most salient. In Experiment 2, when selecting larger, delayed payoffs, both Conflict and Wavering increased suggesting that controlling the temptation of selecting the sooner, smaller reward entails effort. By analyzing trajectories, the study advances knowledge of the construct validity of different action dynamic measures and supports the distinction of decision uncertainty and decision conflict. Copyright © 2015 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.

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Weighing Outcomes by Time or Against Time? Evaluation Rules in Intertemporal Choice

Cited by 58 publications

References 68 publications

Intertemporal Similarity: Discounting as a Last Resort

Intertemporal Similarity: Discounting as a Last Resort

The Value of Nothing: Asymmetric Attention to Opportunity Costs Drives Intertemporal Decision Making

Action Dynamics in Intertemporal Choice Reveal Different Facets of Decision Process

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