发展中的行为决策研究

行为决策研究人们如何进行判断与选择。该学科希望能在描述决策的过程中帮助人们更好地进行决策,其研究的使命是促进和改善我们对人类决策行为的理解。在过去的1年里,中国科学院心理研究所行为决策课题组在社会与经济决策领域中已开展的研究包括：行为决策与脑、社会互动与决策、决策的文化差异、消费与投资的行为决策、效用最大化与幸福感。该文着重报告并讨论了我们在行为决策及其跨文化比较研究中的一些最新的主要发现     

时间贴现的性质与脑机制

时间贴现是指个人对事件的价值量估计随着时间的流逝而下降的心理现象,它是行为选择理论的一个重要组成部分。着重介绍了时间贴现的数学模型（指数模型、双曲线模型族、非双曲线模型）、时间贴现现象和概率贴现现象的联系、延迟兑现与提前兑现时间贴现不对称现象及其理论解释,还讨论了时间贴现现象的神经机制研究。提出了时间贴现未来研究的几个主要问题     

Amount consumed varies as a function of feeder design.

Studies of pigeon behavior in which magazine-cycle duration is varied suggest that many researchers assume that feeders of different designs dispense food at roughly the same rate. However, Epstein (1981) showed that, with a commonly used feeder, the amount of grain a pigeon consumes is a negatively accelerated function of magazine-cycle duration. The present experiment shows that, with a different commonly used feeder, amount consumed is roughly a linear function of magazine-cycle duration. At a duration of 60 seconds, the second feeder dispenses roughly 10 times as much food as the first. Thus, reports of studies in which magazine-cycle duration is varied should identify the design of the feeder employed, and in some cases, authors should consider determining the feeding functions for those feeders.     

Positional Goods and the Social Rank Hypothesis: Income Inequality Affects Online Chatter about High‐ and Low‐Status Brands on Twitter

According to a social rank hypothesis, consumers who live in regions with higher income inequality will show greater interest in, and attention toward, positional goods and high‐status brands that serve a social signaling role. We analyze millions of posts on the microblogging platform Twitter for mentions of high‐ and low‐status brands. We find that luxury brands such as “Louis Vuitton” and “Rolex” are more frequently mentioned in tweets originating from US states, counties, and major metropolitan areas with higher levels of income inequality. In contrast, mentions of everyday brands such as “Walmart” or “Kmart” are more frequent in regions with a more equal distribution of income. Using sentiment analysis, we find higher valence (positivity) and arousal (excitement) for tweets that both mention high‐status brands and originate from regions with high levels of income inequality. These results corroborate the social rank hypothesis, showing that more psychological resources are allocated to positional consumption when the income gap between the rich and the poor is larger.     

Intracellular calcium chelation and pharmacological SERCA inhibition of Ca2+ pump in the insular cortex differentially affect taste aversive memory formation and retrieval

Variation in intracellular calcium concentration regulates the induction of long-term synaptic plasticity and is associated with a variety of memory/retrieval and learning paradigms. Accordingly, impaired calcium mobilization from internal deposits affects synaptic plasticity and cognition in the aged brain. During taste memory formation several proteins are modulated directly or indirectly by calcium, and recent evidence suggests the importance of calcium buffering and the role of intracellular calcium deposits during cognitive processes. Thus, the main goal of this research was to study the consequence of hampering changes in cytoplasmic calcium and inhibiting SERCA activity by BAPTA-AM and thapsigargin treatments, respectively, in the insular cortex during different stages of taste memory formation. Using conditioned taste aversion (CTA), we found differential effects of BAPTA-AM and thapsigargin infusions before and after gustatory stimulation, as well as during taste aversive memory consolidation; BAPTA-AM, but not thapsigargin, attenuates acquisition and/or consolidation of CTA, but neither compound affects taste aversive memory retrieval. These results point to the importance of intracellular calcium dynamics in the insular cortex during different stages of taste aversive memory formation.     

Cognitive Load and the Equality Heuristic: A Two-Stage Model of Resource Overconsumption in Small Groups

Two studies were conducted to test a two-stage model of the psychological mechanisms underlying the overconsumption of scarce resources in small groups. The model proposes that members of groups sharing resources first anchor their consumption choices on an “equal-division” heuristic and then, given sufficient cognitive capacity, adjust their choices in a self-serving direction. The results from both studies support the model. The first study found that when faced with a common resource pool almost all group members expressed thoughts regarding equality; however, individuals with sufficient cognitive capacity requested more from the pool and expressed more task-relevant thoughts than individuals lacking the necessary cognitive resources. The second study provided additional support for the two-stage model by demonstrating that group members' cognitions occur in the order predicted by the model and by demonstrating that an individual difference, social value orientation, affects thought processes only when individuals are not experiencing high cognitive loads. Implications are discussed.     

The relationship between feeding rate and patch choice.

Rats in a laboratory foraging simulation searched for sequential opportunities to feed in two patches that differed in the rate at which food pellets were delivered (controlled by fixed-interval schedules) and in the size of the pellets. The profitability of feeding in each patch was calculated in terms of time (grams per minute) and in terms of effort (grams per bar press). These values were the result of the imposed fixed interval, the size of the pellets, and the rate at which the rats pressed the bar in each condition. The rats ate more food and larger meals, but not more frequent meals, at the patch offering the higher rate of food consumption, calculated as grams per minute. The relative intake at any patch was a function of the relative rate of intake during meals at that patch compared to the other patch. Rats respond to explicit manipulations of feeding time in the same manner as they respond to manipulations of feeding effort.     

Animalizing women and feminizing (vegan) men: The psychological intersections of sexism,speciesism, meat,and masculinity

Images of sexualized women depicted as animals or alongside meat are routinely used in advertising in Western culture. Philosophers and feminist scholars have long theorized that such imagery reflects the lower status of both women and animals (vs. men) in society and argued that prejudiced attitudes towards women (i.e., sexism) and animals (i.e., speciesism) are interconnected, with meat-eating as a core symbol of masculinity. Addressing these key ideas from ecofeminist theory, we review the psychological evidence on the associations between sexism, speciesism, meat, and masculinity. Research on the animalistic dehumanization of women provides evidence that sexism and speciesism are psychologically entangled and rooted in desires for group-based dominance and inequality. Furthermore, research on the symbolic value of meat corroborates its masculine value expressing dominance and power, and suggests that men who abstain from meat consumption (e.g., vegans) are feminized and devalued, particularly by those higher in sexism. We conclude that a greater recognition of the interconnected nature of patriarchal gender relations and practices of animal exploitation, including meat-eating, can help in efforts to improve the status of both women and animals.     

绿色消费的许可效应：绿色让我们更不道德？

绿色消费属于道德范畴,消费者在助推绿色社会发展中的作用日益受到重视。然而,绿色消费会降低指定性道德约束或增强禁止性道德选择,消费者会变得不再绿色甚至自私(如享乐、撒谎或偷窃),这便是绿色消费的许可效应。从时间维度上来说,绿色消费许可效应的产生包括启动效应-绿色消费-许可效应三个阶段。有关该效应的理论解释是道德自我调节。从根本上来说,化解该效应需要消费者养成绿色生活方式,它包括两个路径：一方面,从绿色行为到绿色自我,抽象化表征行为,将绿色行为与自我概念相连接,采用自下而上加工方式实现;另一方面,从绿色自我到绿色行为,基于价值观-行为一致性原则,会促进个体产生更多绿色消费以及节俭和利他,采用的是自上而下加工。文章最后指出未来一些研究方向。     

Thinking about the Needy, Justice, and International Organizations

This article has three main parts, Section 2 considers the nature and extent to which individuals who are well-off have a moral obligation to aid the worlds needy. Drawing on a pluralistic approach to morality, which includes consequentialist, virtue-based, and deontological elements, it is contended that most who are well-off should do much more than they do to aid the needy, and that they are open to serious moral criticism if they simply ignore the needy. Part one also focuses on the United States, and illustrates both how incredibly wealthy the U.S. is and some of the spending habits of its citizens; however, its considerations apply to the well-off generally. Section 3 considers whether justice provides reasons for helping the needy. Noting that justice in an extremely complex notion, it discusses numerous considerations relevant to justices scope and implications, including an extended Rawlsian conception of justice, an absolute conception, a comparative conception, the distinction between natural and social justice, and various elements of common-sense morality. Section 2 also distinguishes between agent-relative justice-based reasons, which are relevant to whether we act justly, and agent-neutral justice-based reasons, which are relevant to whether we have reasons of justicefor acting. Correspondingly, it argues that even if one can ignore the needy without acting unjustly, as philosophers like Robert Nozick and Jan Narveson contend, there may be powerful reasons of justicefor addressing their plight. Section 4 briefly address the responsibilities of international organizations like the World Bank, the International Monetary Fund (IMF), and World Trade Organization (WTO). Drawing on Section 2, it is suggested that in addition to standard reasons to act justlytowards needy members of the worlds community, there will be reasons of justicefor such organizations to aid the needy in both present, and future, generations. The article concludes by contending that the well-off in countries like the U.S. have reason to view international organizations like the World Bank, IMF, and WTO as their agents, and to seek to insure that they alleviate misfortunes amongst the worlds needy.