跨期决策中的负折扣现象及其机制

主流跨期决策模型认为, 跨期决策存在一个时间折扣过程。时间折扣是指人们会根据将来获益或损失的延迟时间对其效用进行折扣, 折扣后的效用小于原来的效用, 而负折扣现象违背了时间折扣过程。负折扣现象出现在金钱、非金钱的获益与损失领域, 其可能的解释机制为预期情绪。目前关于负折扣现象的研究, 较少验证其影响机制, 未来的研究可以结合眼动追踪和fMRI技术探讨其机制, 并丰富对负折扣现象的影响因素研究。

Negative discounting in intertemporal choice

Mainstream models on intertemporal choice assume that a temporal discounting process occurs when people choose between outcomes occurring at different times in an intertemporal choice. Economists and psychologists have proposed a series of models to describe the intertemporal decision-making behavior. Whether it is the initial discounting utility model or the later hyperbolic model, etc., the hypothesis of time discounting has been upheld, which refers to people’s tendency to discount the value of delayed outcomes by the amount of time one must wait for them, thereby reducing the subjective value of these future outcomes. However, there is a phenomenon that fundamentally deviates from the discounting family model—the negative discounting phenomenon. The emergence of negative discounting challenges the time discounting hypothesis held by mainstream intertemporal decision-making models. The current researches on intertemporal choice pay little attention to the negative discounting phenomenon. Its related researches mainly concentrated in the early stage and that on its influencing factors and internal mechanism are even poorer.