解释水平视角下的自己-他人决策差异

研究基于解释水平理论, 考察自己决策和为他人提供建议是否存在认知和偏好上的差异。实验一采用2(自己决策/为他人建议)×2(价值：高/低)×2(可行性：高/低)被试间设计, 165名被试代表自己或他人评价选项的吸引力。实验二采用3×2混合设计, 81名被试代表自己、相似或不相似他人, 为“高价值-低可行”和“低价值-高可行”两选项出价。结果支持了“自己-他人决策差异”：自己决策比为他人提建议在更大程度上受可行性高低的影响, 更为偏爱可行性高的选项; 人际相似性能在一定程度上缩小上述差异。

Self-Other Decision Making Difference:A Construal Level Perspective

For most real-life decisions, people either seek for others’ advice or act as advisors. From the perspective of Construal Level Theory (Trope &; Liberman, 2003; Trope, Liberman, &; Wakslak, 2007), deciding for oneself versus others involves different cognitive processes, and thus leads to divergent preference and decisions. Others, compared to oneself, are psychologically distant. Therefore, people advising for others tend to construct the decision in terms of its end-state or outcome (i.e. desirability aspects); when evaluating personal decisions, however, people will attend to the more specific process to achieve that outcome (i.e. feasibility aspects). Using scenarios, the present study addresses the above issue. Across the two experiments, participants made decisions about supermarket coupons, with various desirability (face value) and feasibility (shopping convenience) combinations. Study 1 investigated the difference in preference when deciding for oneself versus others. 165 participants were presented with four types of coupons along desirability (high/low) and feasibility (high/low) dimensions, and then they made decisions either for themselves or someone else. As expected, the self-other decision making difference emerged. While personal decision makers were highly sensitive to feasibility, advisors paid less attention to these low-level aspects. However, such difference only held in low-desirability condition. In Study 2, similarity was introduced to reduce the psychological distance between oneself and others. Two “mixed” alternatives were constructed with either high desirability and low feasibility or low desirability and high feasibility. 81 participants jointly evaluated the two types of coupons and then indicated their willingness to pay for each of them. Results replicated the self-other decision making difference. Compared to personal decision makers, advisors showed stronger preference toward the high-desirability alternative, with less sensitivity to the feasibility aspects. Meanwhile, advice made for similar others (versus dissimilar counterparts) seemed more consistent with personal decisions. The results supported the self-other decision making difference. Interpersonal distance, as a form of psychological distance, exerts significant influence on the cognitive representation and decision making process. The implications of these findings for social distance, advice giving and taking were discussed.