Deciders
The social transmission of overconfidence
Joey Cheng et al.
Journal of Experimental Psychology: General, forthcoming
Abstract:
We propose and test the overconfidence transmission hypothesis, which predicts that individuals calibrate their self-assessments in response to the confidence others display in their social group. Six studies that deploy a mix of correlational and experimental methods support this hypothesis. Evidence indicates that individuals randomly assigned to collaborate in laboratory dyads converged on levels of overconfidence about their own performance rankings. In a controlled experimental context, observing overconfident peers causally increased an individual’s degree of bias. The transmission effect persisted over time and across task domains, elevating overconfidence even days after initial exposure. In addition, overconfidence spread across indirect social ties (person to person to person), and transmission operated outside of reported awareness. However, individuals showed a selective in-group bias; overconfidence was acquired only when displayed by a member of one’s in-group (and not out-group), consistent with theoretical notions of selective learning bias. Combined, these results advance understanding of the social factors that underlie interindividual differences in overconfidence and suggest that social transmission processes may be in part responsible for why local confidence norms emerge in groups, teams, and organizations.
Working memory capacity predicts individual differences in social-distancing compliance during the COVID-19 pandemic in the United States
Weizhen Xie, Stephen Campbell & Weiwei Zhang
Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, forthcoming
Abstract:
Noncompliance with social distancing during the early stage of the coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) pandemic poses a great challenge to the public health system. These noncompliance behaviors partly reflect people’s concerns for the inherent costs of social distancing while discounting its public health benefits. We propose that this oversight may be associated with the limitation in one’s mental capacity to simultaneously retain multiple pieces of information in working memory (WM) for rational decision making that leads to social-distancing compliance. We tested this hypothesis in 850 United States residents during the first 2 wk following the presidential declaration of national emergency because of the COVID-19 pandemic. We found that participants’ social-distancing compliance at this initial stage could be predicted by individual differences in WM capacity, partly due to increased awareness of benefits over costs of social distancing among higher WM capacity individuals. Critically, the unique contribution of WM capacity to the individual differences in social-distancing compliance could not be explained by other psychological and socioeconomic factors (e.g., moods, personality, education, and income levels). Furthermore, the critical role of WM capacity in social-distancing compliance can be generalized to the compliance with another set of rules for social interactions, namely the fairness norm, in Western cultures. Collectively, our data reveal contributions of a core cognitive process underlying social-distancing compliance during the early stage of the COVID-19 pandemic, highlighting a potential cognitive venue for developing strategies to mitigate a public health crisis.
Fighting COVID-19 Misinformation on Social Media: Experimental Evidence for a Scalable Accuracy-Nudge Intervention
Gordon Pennycook et al.
Psychological Science, July 2020, Pages 770-780
Abstract:
Across two studies with more than 1,700 U.S. adults recruited online, we present evidence that people share false claims about COVID-19 partly because they simply fail to think sufficiently about whether or not the content is accurate when deciding what to share. In Study 1, participants were far worse at discerning between true and false content when deciding what they would share on social media relative to when they were asked directly about accuracy. Furthermore, greater cognitive reflection and science knowledge were associated with stronger discernment. In Study 2, we found that a simple accuracy reminder at the beginning of the study (i.e., judging the accuracy of a non-COVID-19-related headline) nearly tripled the level of truth discernment in participants’ subsequent sharing intentions. Our results, which mirror those found previously for political fake news, suggest that nudging people to think about accuracy is a simple way to improve choices about what to share on social media.
Advisors want their advice to be used – but not too much: An interpersonal perspective on advice taking
Fabian Ache, Christina Rader & Mandy Hütter
Journal of Experimental Social Psychology, forthcoming
Abstract:
Much advice taking research investigates whether advice weighting accords to normative principles for maximizing decision accuracy. The present research complements this normative perspective with an interpersonal one, arguing that judges should also pay attention to how much their advisors want them to weight advice. In four experiments, we found that advisors do not always want their advice to be adopted fully. Instead, they often give advice about which they are uncertain and therefore want their advice to be averaged with judges' initial opinions or not used at all. Furthermore, advisors' desired advice weighting is often congruent with the judges' actual weighting, but moderators that affect advisor or judge confidence can cause desired and actual weighting to diverge (Experiments 1 and 2). When tasks were difficult, judges put more weight on the advice than advisors desired, because increasing the difficulty of the task led advisors to want their advice weighted less, whereas judges placed more weight on the advice. The reverse was true for easy tasks (Experiment 2). Importantly, both weighting more and less than advisors desired caused advisors to evaluate judges more negatively, which resulted in reduced willingness to give advice again in the future (Experiments 3 and 4), indicating that advisors want their advice used, but not too much.
When trust goes wrong: A social identity model of risk taking
Tegan Cruwys et al.
Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, forthcoming
Abstract:
Risk taking is typically viewed through a lens of individual deficits (e.g., impulsivity) or normative influence (e.g., peer pressure). An unexplored possibility is that shared group membership, and the trust that flows from it, may play a role in reducing risk perceptions and promoting risky behavior. We propose and test a Social Identity Model of Risk Taking in eight studies (total N = 4,708) that use multiple methods including minimal group paradigms, correlational, longitudinal, and experimental designs to investigate the effect of shared social identity across diverse risk contexts. Studies 1 and 2 provided evidence for the basic premise of the model, showing that ingroup members were perceived as posing lower risk and inspired greater risk taking behavior than outgroup members. Study 3 found that social identification was a moderator, such that effect of shared group membership was strongest among high identifiers. Studies 4 and 5 among festival attendees showed correlational and longitudinal evidence for the model and further that risk-taking was mediated by trust, not disgust. Study 6 manipulated the mediator and found that untrustworthy faces were trusted more and perceived as less risky when they were ingroup compared with outgroup members. Studies 7 and 8 identified integrity as the subcomponent of trust that consistently promotes greater risk taking in the presence of ingroup members. The findings reveal that a potent source of risk discounting is the group memberships we share with others. Ironically, this means the people we trust the most may sometimes pose the greatest risk.
Risk-taking that signals trust increases social identification
Tegan Cruwys et al.
Social Psychology, forthcoming
Abstract:
Social identification predicts many important phenomena; however, its determinants have received comparably little research attention. We argue that people are more likely to socially identify with others who engage in risky behavior that implies trust than with those who act cautiously, and test this in four experiments with over 900 participants. The experiments found support for the hypotheses across diverse risk contexts – specifically, risk of physical injury, disease risk, and financial risk. These findings indicate that others’ risk taking can strengthen shared psychological group membership.
The Zero Bias in Target Retirement Fund Choice
Ajay Kalra, Xiao Liu & Wei Zhang
Journal of Consumer Research, forthcoming
Abstract:
Using a sample of individuals who hold Target Retirement Funds, we examine how people use arithmetic to estimate their retirement age. We find a robust “zero” bias where investors have a strong preference for TRFs that end with zero compared to TRFs that end with five. The evidence is consistent that the bias is an outcome of people using imprecise arithmetic, specifically rounding up and down in the computational estimation required to estimate their retirement year. The zero bias manifests itself in people born in years ending between eight and two. Those born in zero- through two-ending years select TRFs that imply they intend to retire at 70, whereas those born in eight- and nine-ending years choose TRFs that imply retiring at 60. The choices can significantly lower or increase wealth by altering the contribution amounts and exposing investors to risk incompatible with their age profile. The bias is particularly costly for those who are risk averse and select later TRFs, but is also most beneficial to risk-averse consumers who choose early TRFs. We experimentally confirm that the contribution rates are related to the TRF choices and that the use of imprecise mathematical rounding is implicated in the bias.
The Beauty of the Zero: Replications and Extensions of the Hidden-Zero Effect in Delay Discounting Tasks
Junhua Dang et al.
Social Psychological and Personality Science, forthcoming
Abstract:
Unlike the presentation format in a typical delay discounting task (e.g., “Would you prefer [A] US$4.3 today OR [B] US$7.5 in 22 days?”), Magen et al. inserted a zero to each alternative (e.g., “Would you prefer [A] US$4.3 today and US$0 in 22 days OR [B] US$0 today and US$7.5 in 22 days?”) and found this manipulation effectively reduced delay discounting (d = .84), which was referred to as the hidden-zero effect. Study 1 was a direct replication of this effect. In Study 2, we tested whether the explicit-zero format could buffer against the detrimental effect of exposure to sexy cues on delay discounting. In Study 3, we explored the mechanism underlying the hidden-zero effect. Taken together, the hidden-zero effect was consistently found across all studies (N = 2,440) and our internal meta-analysis yielded a medium to large effect size (d = .52).
Revisiting attribute framing: The impact of number roundedness on framing
Gaurav Jain et al.
Organizational Behavior and Human Decision Processes, November 2020, Pages 109-119
Abstract:
We compare the impact of round and non-round numbers used in a communication message on consumers’ evaluations and judgments towards the associated target entity. We find that the use of non-round numbers, in contrast to round numbers, in a message frame results in increased attention to numerical values, which further leads to a comparison of the associated measures with ideal reference points. This leads to an increased framing effect in the non-round numbers condition compared to the round numbers condition. Interestingly, this also negatively affects consumers’ overall evaluations of the target entity. We demonstrate that such a decreased positivity in attitudes when using non-round numbers is more pronounced in negatively expressed frames. We explain this using an ‘attention shift-comparison’ process. Additionally, using multiple methodologies, we provide elaborated support for the attention-association based reasoning for framing effects in general and thus add to the literature on processes underlying framing effects. This extends the original valence-shift based account originally proposed by Levin and Gaeth (1988) and provides an avenue for future research on attention-association based framing effects.
Effects of process and outcome accountability on escalating commitment: A two-study replication
Stefan Schulz-Hardt et al.
Journal of Experimental Psychology: Applied, forthcoming
Abstract:
Escalating commitment describes the phenomenon that decision makers may become stuck in losing courses of action, throwing good money after bad. In a seminal study, testing interventions against escalating commitment, Simonson and Staw (1992) found that holding decision makers accountable for the decision process (i.e., the decision strategies they use) decreases escalating commitment, whereas accountability for the decision outcomes tends to increase it. The initial aim of our study was to extend the original findings by testing for interactive effects of both types of accountability. However, as we did not replicate the original effects in a first experiment, in spite of the fact that our materials and our procedure resembled the original study as closely as possible, we conducted a second experiment with an even stronger accountability manipulation as compared to the original study, and with an increased sample size. Once again, no effects of accountability were found. Taken together, the results of these two experiments question the robustness of the original findings.
Confidence in Context: Perceived Accuracy of Quantitative Estimates Decreases With Repeated Trials
Julia Minson & Christopher Umphres
Psychological Science, forthcoming
Abstract:
Across seven studies (combined N = 5,484), we demonstrated that confidence in one’s judgments decreases over a series of quantitative estimates. This finding was robust to various methods of confidence elicitation, the presence of incentives, and different estimation topics (Studies 1, 2, and 4). Our results also stand in contrast to participant expectations (Study 3). The phenomenon does not appear to be driven by fatigue, lack of effort, or various explanations based on incorporating uncertainty from prior judgments into subsequent ones. Our findings suggest that rather than evaluating confidence in isolation, participants evaluate confidence in reference to their stated confidence on earlier judgments. We theorize that confidence in earlier judgments increases in hindsight because of biased forgetting of disconfirming evidence. As a result, confidence in subsequent judgments appears to be comparatively lower (preregistered Studies 5–7). We discuss the implications for confidence research and consumer, organizational, and policy decision-making.