Alternative reference points and outcome evaluation: the influence of affect

Two studies examined the effect of affective states on decision outcome evaluation under the presence or absence of salient alternative reference points. Alternative reference points exist when there are 2 possible referents from which an outcome can be evaluated, and the outcome is judged as good from the perspective of one referent and bad from the perspective of the other. The results support a motivational process of evaluating outcomes in which individuals select the reference point that allows them to maintain positive mood or improve negative mood. Mood measurements taken before and after the task revealed that those in positive moods maintained their mood whether or not they had alternative reference points in the evaluation of their outcomes. Those in negative affective states improved their mood only when there was an alternative reference point that allowed the outcome to be compared favorably; when there was no such alternative reference point, they maintained their negative mood.     

Even better than the real thing: Alternative outcome bias affects decision judgements and decision regret

Three experiments demonstrated that decisions resulting in considerable amounts of profit, but missed alternative outcomes of greater profits, were rated lower in quality and produced more regret than did decisions that returned lesser (or equal) amounts of profit but either did not miss or missed only slightly better alternatives. These effects were mediated by upward counterfactuals and moderated by participants’ orientation to the decision context. That decision evaluations were affected by the availability and magnitude of alternative outcomes rather than the positivity of actual outcomes is counter to the outcome bias effect—a bias in which decisions are rated more positively when they led to more positive outcomes (despite a priori probabilities associated with the decision outcomes). Experiment 3 demonstrated that these effects represent a bias that occurs even when it is clear that the process by which decisions were made followed rational decision processes. This research suggests that when alternative worlds are even better than the desirable outcomes experienced, affect and cognition may be more strongly linked to the magnitude of alternative realities than to obtained outcomes.     

The Effects of Decision Outcome Dispersion Upon Organizational Decision Making

The effects of varying decision outcome dispersion on organizational decision making were investigated under individual and group decision making conditions. Thirty-six female and pg]36 male subjects made decisions for organizational decision scenarios in which outcomes affected primarily the decision maker, people other than the decision maker, or a group of which the decision maker was a member. Subjects rated their levels of perceived risk and confidence in their decisions and made decisions within a simulated context of either a small or a large organization. Results indicated that subjects perceived significantly less risk and more confidence in their decisions when outcomes affected primarily themselves rather than others regardless of whether the decisions were made individually or by a group. Males perceived their decisions as significantly more risky than females. Induced organizational size did not significantly influence decision making.

     

结果评价中自我体验与替代体验的参照点效应:一项赌博游戏的ERPs研究

本研究采用"投注—反馈"的虚拟赌博游戏范式,通过2个实验分别检测个体在评价自己决策结果 (实验1)和观察他人决策结果 (实验2)过程中赌注大小(即参照点)对大脑活动的影响。结果发现:(1)体验自我决策结果时,输钱比赢钱诱发更负的FRN,仅有一个负反馈(-10元)表现出以赌注为界的分离,且相对效价一样的反馈值诱发的FRN差异不显著;(2)体验他人决策结果时,无论输赢,有赌注比无赌注诱发的FRN更负;而且相对效价相同的反馈值诱发的FRN差异不显著。据此可以认为,FRN一定程度上反映了以赌注为基准的主观标准对社会信息的评价判断:自我体验中的个体对损失的敏感度远高于收益;而替代体验中的个体更倾向于将"损失更多"看作一种负性结果。     

All's well that ends well? Outcome bias in pilots during instrument flight rules

The objective of the present study was to examine if the Outcome Bias also occurs in pilots flying under instrument flight rules (IFR). In a scenario-based survey, 60 pilots evaluated weather-related decisions made by hypothetical pilots. Participants rated the decisions as better, less risky, and regarded the probability that they would have made the same decision as higher when they were followed by a positive outcome, than when they were followed by a negative outcome. This effect showed likewise for novice pilots and for experienced pilots. These findings could be relevant for the flight-related decision-making of pilots, which sometimes is affected by the decisions made by third-party pilots. In particular, decisions made by other pilots that have led to positive outcomes might be hastily followed, whereas those that have led to negative outcomes might be hastily rejected.     

Different Attentional Patterns for Regret and Disappointment: An Eye‐tracking Study

The unfavorable comparison between the obtained and expected outcomes of our choices may elicit disappointment. When the comparison is made with the outcome of alternative actions, emotions like regret can serve as a learning signal. Previous work showed that both anticipated disappointment and regret influence decisions. In addition, experienced regret is associated with higher emotional responses than disappointment. Yet it is not clear whether this amplification is due to additive effects of disappointment and regret when the outcomes of alternative actions are available, or whether it reflects the learning feature of regret signals. In this perspective, we used eye‐tracking to measure the visual pattern of information acquisition in a probabilistic lottery task. In the partial feedback condition, only the outcome of the chosen lottery was revealed, while in the complete feedback condition, participants could compare their outcome with that of the non‐chosen lottery, giving them the opportunity to experience regret. During the decision phase, visual patterns of information acquisition were consistent with the assessment of anticipated regret, in addition to a clear assessment of lotteries' expected values. During the feedback phase, subjective ratings and eye‐tracking results confirmed that participants compared their outcome with the outcome of the non‐chosen lottery in the complete feedback condition, particularly after a loss, and ignored the non‐realized outcome of the chosen option. Moreover, participants who made more visual saccades consistent with counterfactual comparisons during the feedback period anticipated regret more in their decisions. These results are consistent with the proposed adaptive function of regret. © 2016 The Authors Journal of Behavioral Decision Making Published by John Wiley & Sons Ltd.     

How readers experience characters’ decisions

When people read narratives, they have ample opportunities to encode mental preferences about characters’ decisions. In our present project, we examined how readers’ preferences for characters’ decisions structure their experiences of story outcomes. In Experiment 1, participants read brief stories and explicitly rated which of two potential decisions they thought the characters should make. The actual decision that each character made was either preferred or nonpreferred by readers. By the end of each story, readers learned whether there was a positive or negative outcome to these decisions. Decisions and outcomes either matched (e.g., a preferred decision followed by a positive outcome) or did not match (e.g., a nonpreferred decision followed by a negative outcome). Participants took longer to read outcome sentences when there was a mismatch. In Experiment 2, we replicated this finding with a task that allowed more natural reading. These results provide converging evidence that readers encode responses to characters’ decisions and that these responses affect the time course with which they assimilate story outcomes.     

Distortion of probability and outcome information in risky decisions

Substantial evidence indicates that information is distorted during decision making, but very few studies have assessed the distortion of probability and outcome information in risky decisions. In two studies involving six binary decisions (e.g., banning blood donations from people who have visited England, because of “mad cow disease”), student and nonstudent participants distorted their evaluations of probability and outcome information in the direction of their preferred decision alternative and used these biased evaluations to update their preferences. Participants also evaluated the utilities of possible outcomes more positively when the outcomes could follow only from the preferred alternative and more negatively when they could follow only from the competing alternative. Such circular reasoning is antithetical to the normative consequentialist principles underlying decision analysis. Presenting numerical information as precise values or as ranges of values did not significantly affect information distortion, apparently because the manipulation did not affect perceived ambiguity as intended.     

The one-of-us effect in decision evaluation

Judgment-by-outcomes denotes basing retrospective evaluation of decisions on the valence of their outcomes (success versus failure). Although decisions are typically evaluated in social contexts, so far judgment-by-outcomes has been studied without regard to this context. This study examines the moderating effect of evaluator's identification with the decision maker (the one-of-us-effect) on the influence of outcome information on the evaluation of Arab and Jewish subjects were presented with two cases recounting operations by either Arab or Jewish underground directed against the British authorities in Palestine. One case was a success (from the underground's point of view) and one ended in failure. Consistent with the one-of-us effect, identification with the decision maker variably canceled the influence of outcome information altogether, accentuated or weakened its influence, or determined which outcome constituted successful and unsuccessful outcomes. The one-of-us effect exercised a differential influence over different facets of decision evaluation, influencing most strongly the assignment of sanctions (in-group decision makers were mostly rewarded, out-group decision-makers were mostly punished regardless of outcomes). Next, in order of potency, the effect influenced the evaluation of decision justification, the evaluation of the decision maker, and the evaluation of the quality of decision process.     

Better safe than sorry: Precautionary reasoning and implied dominance in risky decisions

In four studies, student and nonstudent participants evaluated the possible outcomes of binary decisions involving health, safety, and environmental risks (e.g., whether to issue a dam‐failure evacuation order). Many participants indicated that false positives (e.g., evacuation, but no dam failure) were better than true negatives (e.g., no evacuation and no dam failure), thereby implying that the more protective action dominated the less protective action. A common rationale for this response pattern was the precautionary maxim “better safe than sorry.” Participants apparently evaluated outcomes partly on the basis of the decisions that might lead to them, in conflict with consequentialist decision models. Consistent with this explanation, the prevalence of implied dominance decreased substantially when the emphasis on decisions was reduced. These results demonstrate that an initial preference for a decision alternative can alter the evaluation of possible consequences of both the preferred alternative and a competing alternative, suggesting positive feedback loops that reinforce the initial preference. The rationality of considering the decision itself as an attribute of possible outcomes is discussed. Copyright © 2009 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Cognitive reference points in judgments of symbolic magnitude

Research on speeded symbolic magnitude comparisons indicates that decisions are made more quickly when the magnitudes of the stimuli being compared are relatively close to an explicit or implicit reference point. Alternative explanations of this phenomenon are tested by seeking similar effects in nonspeeded rating tasks. In accord with the predictions of discriminability models, rated magnitude differences between stimuli in the vicinity of a reference point are expanded relative to differences between stimuli far from it. The inferred locations of cities along a west-east axis varies systematically depending on which coast, Pacific or Atlantic, is specified as the reference point. Scales derived from the rating data are correlated with the pattern of reaction times obtained in a comparable speeded comparison task. In addition, the distance between the cities nearest the locale of our subjects is subjectively stretched. Reference point effects are also observed when the form of the comparative specifies an implicit reference point at either end of a continuum of subjective size; however, these effects are very small and do not clearly support a discriminability interpretation. Stronger evidence for discriminability effects is obtained when an explicit reference point is established at an arbitrary size value. An implicit scaling model, related to range-frequency theory, is proposed to account for the influence of reference points on relative discriminability of stimulus magnitudes. The implicit scaling model is used to develop an account of how symbolic magnitudes may be learned and of how habitual reference points can produce asymmetries in distance judgments.     

The gap between medical and monetary choices under risk persists in decisions for others

Decisions under risk in the medical domain have been found to systematically diverge from decisions in the monetary domain. When making choices between monetary options, people commonly rely on a decision strategy that trades off outcomes with their probabilities; when making choices between medical options, people tend to neglect probability information. In two experimental studies, we tested to what extent differences between medical and monetary decisions also emerge when the decision outcomes affect another person. Using a risky choice paradigm for medical and monetary decisions, we compared hypothetical decisions that participants made for themselves to decisions for a socially distant other (Study 1) and to recommendations as financial advisor or doctor (Study 2). In addition, we examined people's information search in a condition in which information about payoff distributions had to be learned from experiential sampling. Formal modeling and analyses of search behavior revealed a similarly pronounced gap between medical and monetary decisions in decisions for others as in decisions for oneself. Our results suggest that when making medical decisions, people try to avoid the worst outcome while neglecting its probability—even when the outcomes affect others rather than themselves.     

I Was Pleased a Moment Ago: How Pleasure Varies with Background and Foreground Reference Points

The pleasure of an outcome is often evaluated relative to salient reference points. In the background, increasing sequences of positive outcomes are more enjoyable than decreasing sequences. In the foreground, outcomes that could have been worse are often more enjoyable than those that could have been better. How does pleasure vary when both background and foreground reference points are salient? Using a repeated gambling task in which participants make a choice, learn the outcome, watch their cumulative earnings change, and rate the pleasure of the outcome, we explore this question. Pleasure depends on background and foreground reference points, but the immediate events tend to dominate. The relatively narrow focus on the most recent reference points leads to myopic pleasure. We offer a modified version of decision affect theory to account for the results and explore the implications for consumer satisfaction.     

Attributions of responsibility and affective reactions to decision outcomes

Immediate affective reactions to outcomes are more intense following decisions to act than following decisions not to act. This finding holds for both positive and negative outcomes. We relate this "actor-effect" to attribution theory and argue that decision makers are seen as more responsible for outcomes when these are the result of a decision to act as compared to a decision not to act. Experiment 1 (N = 80) tests the main assumption underlying our reasoning and shows that affective reactions to decision outcomes are indeed more intense when the decision maker is seen as more responsible. Experiment 2 (N = 40) tests whether the actor effect can be predicted on the basis of differential attributions following action and inaction. Participants read vignettes in which active and passive actors obtained a positive or negative outcome. Action resulted in more intense affect than inaction, and positive outcomes resulted in more intense affect than negative outcomes. Experiment 2 further shows that responsibility attributions and affective reactions to outcomes are highly correlated; that is, more extreme affective reactions are associated with more internal attributions. We discuss the implications for research on post-decisional reactions.     

The influence of test scores and naturally-occurring pupil characteristics on psychoeducational decision making with children

A computer simulation of psychoeducational decision making was used to study the extent to which the assessment and decision-making process differs for different kinds of students, the extent to which naturally-occurring pupil characteristics (appearance, sex) influence diagnostic outcomes, and the extent to which decision makers perceive different assessment information and pupil characteristics as influencing their decisions. The decision-making process did not differ as a function of differences in referral information. While SES, sex and physical appearance did not affect outcome decisions, the nature of the reason for referral did. Scores on achievement tests, intelligence tests, and the disparity between the two were rated as having the greatest influence on the eligibility, classification, and prognostic decisions that were made. Decision makers said they were not influenced by naturally-occurring pupil characteristics.     

Eyes on the Prize? Evidence of Diminishing Attention to Experienced and Foregone Outcomes in Repeated Experiential Choice

Recently, there has been increased interest in decisions‐from‐experience (where decision makers learn from observing the outcomes of previous choices), which provide valuable insights into the learning and preference construction processes underlying many daily decisions. Several process models have been developed to capture these processes, and while such models often fit the data well, many assume that the decision maker is a vigilant observer, processing each outcome. In two studies, we provide a critical test of this assumption using eye tracking to record directed visual attention when participants choose repeatedly among two options, each time being shown the outcome for their chosen option and for the foregone option. Consistently, we find that the vigilance assumption is not supported, with decision makers often not attending to outcome information. Moreover, (in)attention to outcomes is predictable, with vigilance decreasing as more choices are made, and being greater for obtained than for foregone outcomes, and when options deliver only gains as opposed to losses or a mixture of gains and losses. Furthermore, we find that this variation in attentional allocation plays a central role in the apparent indecisiveness (inconsistency) in choice, with increased attention to foregone outcomes predicting switches to that option on the next choice. Together, these findings highlight the value of eye tracking in investigations of decisions‐from‐experience, providing novel insight into the cognitive processes underlying them. Copyright © 2015 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Walking through interaction. Comments on Harold H. Kelley's: ‘Expanding the analysis of social interactions by reference to the sequential-temporal structures of situations’

Kelley proposes to analyse social orientations in terms of decision making. Social orientations are defined by classes of decision rules which an individual adopts when entering and developing an interaction with another person. Contrary to the most traditional approach, outcome allocation decisions are only an element of a chain of decisions made by the individual. The new theory broadens our view of interactions, draws our attention to their complexity and their dynamics. On the other hand, Kelley's man behaves as if he or she processed information in a systematic way, perceived long-term outcomes and as if he or she controlled the interaction to achieve desirable outcomes. The vision of man as an internally consistent decision-maker is questionable. Many choices made in interaction with others are spontaneous and emotion driven rather than a result of deliberate information processing. Kelley's theory offers a highly sophisticated tool for a temporal analysis of social interactions even though it cannot be applied to the entire spectrum of interdependence situations. © 1997 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Being responsible versus acting responsibly: Effects of agency and risk taking on responsibility judgments

In three experimental studies, with managers and students as participants, we explore in this paper the relation between two kinds of responsibility judgments, called Responsibility 1 (R1) and Responsibility 2 (R2). Decision makers can be viewed as being more or less responsible for their choice and its consequences (R1). Their actions can also be evaluated, from a normative point of view, as instances of more or less responsible behavior (R2). Experiment 1 showed that managers who depart from the default or “normal” course of action, by choosing a new (versus familiar) alternative, changing (versus sticking to) an initial decision, or going against (versus following) the advice of a management team, are rated as more responsible (R1) for the outcomes of their decision. At the same time, they are perceived to act in a less responsible way (R2). Experiment 2 compared decision makers choosing between more or less risky options. High risk takers were held more responsible (R1) for their choice and for its consequences, but were again viewed as behaving in a less responsible way (R2) than low risk takers. In Experiment 3, participants judged decision makers who followed or opposed others' advice by choosing either a high or a low risk option. Opposing others' advice led to higher R1 and lower R2 scores, especially when choosing the high risk option, moderated by outcome (successful decisions appearing more responsible than those that went wrong). Thus R1 and R2 judgments should be distinguished as having different and sometimes even opposite determinants.