Choice pro
Liberals Think More Analytically (More "WEIRD") Than Conservatives
Thomas Talhelm et al.
Personality and Social Psychology Bulletin, forthcoming
Abstract:
Henrich, Heine, and Norenzayan summarized cultural differences in psychology and argued that people from one particular culture are outliers: people from societies that are Western, educated, industrialized, rich, and democratic (WEIRD). This study shows that liberals think WEIRDer than conservatives. In five studies with more than 5,000 participants, we found that liberals think more analytically (an element of WEIRD thought) than moderates and conservatives. Study 3 replicates this finding in the very different political culture of China, although it held only for people in more modernized urban centers. These results suggest that liberals and conservatives in the same country think as if they were from different cultures. Studies 4 to 5 show that briefly training people to think analytically causes them to form more liberal opinions, whereas training them to think holistically causes shifts to more conservative opinions.
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Playing the Field: The Effect of Fertility on Women's Desire for Variety
Kristina Durante & Ashley Rae Arsena
Journal of Consumer Research, forthcoming
Abstract:
Previous research finds that ovulation - the time each month when women are most fertile - can shift women's mating psychology and increase their desire for new options in men. But, might ovulation also increase women's desire for new products? Four studies find that women select a greater number of unique options from consumer product sets at high fertility. This effect is especially strong for women in committed relationships. Additional findings show that the fertility shift in desire for variety in products is driven by the fertility shift in desire for new options in men activating a variety-seeking mindset. Subsequently, loyalty to a romantic partner, whether manipulated or measured, moderated the effect of fertility on consumer variety-seeking. This research contributes to the literature by revealing when, why, and how fertility influences desire for variety in consumer choice and highlights the mating motives that underlie this effect.
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"Nothing Good Ever Came from New Jersey": Expectations and the Sensory Perception of Wines
Robert Ashton
Journal of Wine Economics, December 2014, Pages 304-319
Abstract:
The influence of expectations on the sensory perception of wines is investigated in three studies in which New Jersey and California red wines are blind tasted. Studies 1 and 2, in which only the color of the wines is known prior to tasting, demonstrate that neither wine club members nor experienced wine professionals can distinguish between New Jersey and California wines in terms of personal enjoyment. In contrast, Study 3, in which tasters are informed that some (though not which) of the wines are from New Jersey, finds that when a wine is believed to be from New Jersey it receives lower enjoyment ratings than when the identical wine is believed to be from California - regardless of whether the wine is actually from New Jersey or California. The results enhance our understanding of the role of expectations in the interpretation of subjective experiences. Implications for wine producers and wine consumers are explored.
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Mark Brandt, Anthony Evans & Jarret Crawford
Psychological Science, forthcoming
Abstract:
People with extreme political opinions are alternatively characterized as being relatively unthinking or as confident consumers and practitioners of politics. In three studies, we tested these competing hypotheses using cognitive anchoring tasks (total N = 6,767). Using two different measures of political extremity, we found that extremists were less influenced than political moderates by two types of experimenter-generated anchors (Studies 1-3) and that this result was mediated by extremists' belief superiority (Study 2). Extremists and moderates, however, were not differentially influenced by self-generated anchors (Study 2), which suggests that extremists differentiated between externally and internally generated anchors. These results are consistent with the confident-extremist perspective and contradict the unthinking-extremist perspective. The present studies demonstrate the utility of adopting a basic cognitive task to investigate the relationship between ideology and cognitive style and suggest that extremity does not necessarily beget irrationality.
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Stephan Lau, Anette Hiemisch & Roy Baumeister
Consciousness and Cognition, May 2015, Pages 30-46
Abstract:
Six experiments tested two competing models of subjective freedom during decision-making. The process model is mainly based on philosophical conceptions of free will and assumes that features of the process of choosing affect subjective feelings of freedom. In contrast, the outcome model predicts that subjective freedom is due to positive outcomes that can be expected or are achieved by a decision. Results heavily favored the outcome model over the process model. For example, participants felt freer when choosing between two equally good than two equally bad options. Process features including number of options, complexity of decision, uncertainty, having the option to defer the decision, conflict among reasons, and investing high effort in choosing generally had no or even negative effects on subjective freedom. In contrast, participants reported high freedom with good outcomes and low freedom with bad outcomes, and ease of deciding increased subjective freedom, consistent with the outcome model.
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Jiewen Hong & Hannah Chang
Journal of Consumer Research, forthcoming
Abstract:
Results from six experiments support the hypothesis that an accessible independent self-construal promotes a greater reliance on feelings in making judgments and decisions, whereas an accessible interdependent self-construal promotes a greater reliance on reasons. Specifically, compared to an interdependent self-construal, an independent self-construal increases the relative preference for affectively superior options as opposed to cognitively superior options (experiments 1A and 1B), and strengthens the effects of incidental mood on evaluations (experiment 2). Further, valuations of the decision outcome increase when independent (interdependent) consumers adopt a feeling-based (reason-based) decision strategy (experiment 3). Finally, these effects are moderated by decision focus (whether the decision is made for oneself or for others; experiment 4) and need for justification during decision making (experiment 5). Theoretical implications and managerial implications are discussed.
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The Budget Contraction Effect: How Contracting Budgets Lead to Less Varied Choice
Kurt Carlson et al.
Journal of Marketing Research, forthcoming
Abstract:
How do consumers adjust their spending when their budget changes? A common view is that the allocation of one's current budget should not depend on past budget allocations. Contrary to this, we find that when one's budget contracts to a particular level, consumers select less variety (as measured by the number of different items with some of the budget allocated to them) than when their budget expands to that same level. This budget contraction effect stems from a reduction in variety under the contracting budget, not from variety expansion under the expanding budget. Evidence from our experiments indicate that the effect is driven by a desire to avoid feelings of loss associated with spreading allocation cuts (relative to reference quantities from prior allocations) across many items.
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Own-Nationality Bias: Evidence from UEFA Champions League Football Referees
Bryson Pope & Nolan Pope
Economic Inquiry, forthcoming
Abstract:
We examine the existence and magnitude of own-nationality bias. Using player-match level data from 12 seasons of the UEFA Champions League (UCL) and referee assignment policies that pair players and referees from the same country, we determine the bias that referees exhibit toward players from their native country. Players officiated by a referee from the same country receive a 10% increase in beneficial foul calls. Referees' own-nationality bias is more pronounced for national team players, players at home, and in later stages of the tournament. Elite referees exhibit as much, or more, own-nationality bias as their less experienced counterparts.
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Crowdsourcing the Unknown: The Satellite Search for Genghis Khan
Albert Yu-Min Lin et al.
PLoS ONE, December 2014
Abstract:
Massively parallel collaboration and emergent knowledge generation is described through a large scale survey for archaeological anomalies within ultra-high resolution earth-sensing satellite imagery. Over 10K online volunteers contributed 30K hours (3.4 years), examined 6,000 km2, and generated 2.3 million feature categorizations. Motivated by the search for Genghis Khan's tomb, participants were tasked with finding an archaeological enigma that lacks any historical description of its potential visual appearance. Without a pre-existing reference for validation we turn towards consensus, defined by kernel density estimation, to pool human perception for "out of the ordinary" features across a vast landscape. This consensus served as the training mechanism within a self-evolving feedback loop between a participant and the crowd, essential driving a collective reasoning engine for anomaly detection. The resulting map led a National Geographic expedition to confirm 55 archaeological sites across a vast landscape. A increased ground-truthed accuracy was observed in those participants exposed to the peer feedback loop over those whom worked in isolation, suggesting collective reasoning can emerge within networked groups to outperform the aggregate independent ability of individuals to define the unknown.
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Sound credit scores and financial decisions despite cognitive aging
Ye Li et al.
Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, 6 January 2015, Pages 65-69
Abstract:
Age-related deterioration in cognitive ability may compromise the ability of older adults to make major financial decisions. We explore whether knowledge and expertise accumulated from past decisions can offset cognitive decline to maintain decision quality over the life span. Using a unique dataset that combines measures of cognitive ability (fluid intelligence) and of general and domain-specific knowledge (crystallized intelligence), credit report data, and other measures of decision quality, we show that domain-specific knowledge and expertise provide an alternative route for sound financial decisions. That is, cognitive aging does not spell doom for financial decision-making in domains where the decision maker has developed expertise. These results have important implications for public policy and for the design of effective interventions and decision aids.
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Busy Brains, Boasters' Gains: Self-Promotion Effectiveness Depends on Audiences' Cognitive Resources
Alison Fragale & Adam Grant
Journal of Experimental Social Psychology, forthcoming
Abstract:
Impression management research suggests variability in the effectiveness of self-promotion: audiences grant self-promoters more status in some situations than others. We propose that self-promotion effectiveness depends on the audience's cognitive resources. When audiences are cognitively busy, they are more likely to misattribute the source of promoting information, and thus fail to penalize self-promoters for violating norms of politeness and modesty. Thus, self-promoters are perceived as more communal, and granted more status, when audiences are cognitively busy. These predictions were supported across two experiments, which varied the source of the promoting information about a target (self vs. other, Experiment 1), and the level of self-promotion (Experiment 2), and used different manipulations of cognitive busyness - divided mental attention (Experiment 1) and time pressure (Experiment 2). These studies provide insight into the conditions under which self-promotion is effective vs. ineffective, and contribute to our theoretical understanding of status judgments.
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The Making of Might-Have-Beens: Effects of Free Will Belief on Counterfactual Thinking
Jessica Alquist et al.
Personality and Social Psychology Bulletin, forthcoming
Abstract:
Counterfactual thoughts are based on the assumption that one situation could result in multiple possible outcomes. This assumption underlies most theories of free will and contradicts deterministic views that there is only one possible outcome of any situation. Three studies tested the hypothesis that stronger belief in free will would lead to more counterfactual thinking. Experimental manipulations (Studies 1-2) and a measure (Studies 3-4) of belief in free will were linked to increased counterfactual thinking in response to autobiographical (Studies 1, 3, and 4) and hypothetical (Study 2) events. Belief in free will also predicted the kind of counterfactuals generated. Belief in free will was associated with an increase in the generation of self and upward counterfactuals, which have been shown to be particularly useful for learning. These findings fit the view that belief in free will is promoted by societies because it facilitates learning and culturally valued change.
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Positive Consequences of Conflict on Decision Making: When a Conflict Mindset Facilitates Choice
Jennifer Savary et al.
Journal of Experimental Psychology: General, forthcoming
Abstract:
Much research has shown that conflict is aversive and leads to increased choice deferral. In contrast, we have proposed that conflict can be beneficial. Specifically, exposure to nonconscious goal conflict can activate a mindset (a set of cognitive procedures) that facilitates the systematic processing of information without triggering the associated costs, such as negative affect and stress. In a conflict mindset, people should be better able to make tradeoffs and resolve choice conflict. We tested this proposition in 4 experiments, and demonstrated that priming conflicting goals before a decision increases choice in domains unrelated to the primed conflict. We further demonstrated that increased choice occurs because people in a conflict mindset process choice information more systematically, and we rule out several alternative explanations for the results.
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Waiting When Both Certainty and Magnitude Are Increasing: Certainty Overshadows Magnitude
Tara Webb & Michael Young
Journal of Behavioral Decision Making, forthcoming
Abstract:
In everyday decision making, people often face decisions with outcomes that differ on multiple dimensions. The trade-off in preferences between magnitude, temporal proximity, and probability of an outcome is a fundamental concern in the decision-making literature. Yet, their joint effects on behavior in an experience-based decision-making task are understudied. Two experiments examined the relative influences of the magnitude and probability of an outcome when both were increasing over a 10-second delay. A first-person shooter video game was adapted for this purpose. Experiment 1 showed that participants waited longer to ensure a higher probability of the outcome than to ensure a greater magnitude when experienced separately and together. Experiment 2 provided a precise method of comparing their relative control on waiting by having each increase at different rates. Both experiments revealed a stronger influence of increasing probability than increasing magnitude. The results were more consistent with hyperbolic discounting of probability than with cumulative prospect theory's decision weight function.
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Choosing between options associated with past and future regret
Yaniv Shani, Shai Danziger & Marcel Zeelenberg
Organizational Behavior and Human Decision Processes, January 2015, Pages 107-114
Abstract:
People sometimes choose between options associated with already-missed and to-be-missed counterfactuals, or put differently, between past and future regret. We find that these objectively irrelevant associations systematically sway peoples' choices. Results show participants prefer options associated with past promotions (Studies 1-3), and they experience more regret and feel more responsible for missing a future promotion (Studies 1 and 2). Study 2 also shows that participants' preference for products associated with a past miss decreases when they know they will not encounter the future miss (promotion). Study 3 shows this preference also decreases when the product is utilized before the future miss becomes available. Finally, in a non-promotion context, Study 4 demonstrates that people distance themselves from a future miss when they are responsible for the miss but not when another person is responsible for it. These findings are related to regret, inaction inertia and the psychology of discounts.
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How Multiple Anchors Affect Judgment: Evidence from the Lab and eBay
Yan Zhang, Ye Li & Ting Zhu
University of Chicago Working Paper, November 2014
Abstract:
The vast majority of anchoring research has found that judgments assimilate toward single anchors, but no papers have directly compared the impact of one anchor with that of multiple anchors. We hypothesized that the presence of additional anchors can reverse the usual anchoring effect. When one anchor is paired with a second, moderate anchor, people rely more on the additional anchor when the original anchor is extreme than when it is moderate. Extreme original anchors therefore generate less extreme estimates than moderate original anchors do in the two-anchor case - a reversed anchoring effect. Three controlled experiments verified that although estimates assimilated to single anchors, the reverse occurred when people were simultaneously given a second anchor: extremely low (high) anchors generated higher (lower) estimates than moderately low (high) anchors. A natural experiment using eBay auctions in the U.S. and China provided corroborating evidence. This research has implications for pricing strategies when there is more than one price cue available.