You don’t want to know what you’re missing: When information about forgone rewards impedes dynamic decision making
When people learn to make decisions from experience, a reasonable intuition is that additional relevant information should improve their performance. In contrast, we find that additional information about foregone rewards (i.e., what could have gained at each point by making a different choice) seve...
| Main Authors: | , |
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| Format: | Article |
| Language: | English |
| Published: |
Cambridge University Press
2010-02-01
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| Series: | Judgment and Decision Making |
| Subjects: | |
| Online Access: | https://www.cambridge.org/core/product/identifier/S1930297500001984/type/journal_article |
| _version_ | 1827831583657164800 |
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| author | A. Ross Otto Bradley C. Love |
| author_facet | A. Ross Otto Bradley C. Love |
| author_sort | A. Ross Otto |
| collection | DOAJ |
| description | When people learn to make decisions from experience, a reasonable intuition is that additional relevant information should improve their performance. In contrast, we find that additional information about foregone rewards (i.e., what could have gained at each point by making a different choice) severely hinders participants’ ability to repeatedly make choices that maximize long-term gains. We conclude that foregone reward information accentuates the local superiority of short-term options (e.g., consumption) and consequently biases choice away from productive long-term options (e.g., exercise). These conclusions are consistent with a standard reinforcement-learning mechanism that processes information about experienced and forgone rewards. In contrast to related contributions using delay-of-gratification paradigms, we do not posit separate top-down and emotion-driven systems to explain performance. We find that individual and group data are well characterized by a single reinforcement-learning mechanism that combines information about experienced and foregone rewards. |
| first_indexed | 2024-03-12T04:52:36Z |
| format | Article |
| id | doaj.art-26a4c928d48c41b695da79e64b760af6 |
| institution | Directory Open Access Journal |
| issn | 1930-2975 |
| language | English |
| last_indexed | 2024-03-12T04:52:36Z |
| publishDate | 2010-02-01 |
| publisher | Cambridge University Press |
| record_format | Article |
| series | Judgment and Decision Making |
| spelling | doaj.art-26a4c928d48c41b695da79e64b760af62023-09-03T09:20:22ZengCambridge University PressJudgment and Decision Making1930-29752010-02-01511010.1017/S1930297500001984You don’t want to know what you’re missing: When information about forgone rewards impedes dynamic decision makingA. Ross Otto0Bradley C. Love1Department of Psychology, University of Texas at AustinDepartment of Psychology, University of Texas at AustinWhen people learn to make decisions from experience, a reasonable intuition is that additional relevant information should improve their performance. In contrast, we find that additional information about foregone rewards (i.e., what could have gained at each point by making a different choice) severely hinders participants’ ability to repeatedly make choices that maximize long-term gains. We conclude that foregone reward information accentuates the local superiority of short-term options (e.g., consumption) and consequently biases choice away from productive long-term options (e.g., exercise). These conclusions are consistent with a standard reinforcement-learning mechanism that processes information about experienced and forgone rewards. In contrast to related contributions using delay-of-gratification paradigms, we do not posit separate top-down and emotion-driven systems to explain performance. We find that individual and group data are well characterized by a single reinforcement-learning mechanism that combines information about experienced and foregone rewards.https://www.cambridge.org/core/product/identifier/S1930297500001984/type/journal_articledecision-makingdelay of gratificationlearningself-controldynamic environmentsreinforcement learning |
| spellingShingle | A. Ross Otto Bradley C. Love You don’t want to know what you’re missing: When information about forgone rewards impedes dynamic decision making Judgment and Decision Making decision-making delay of gratification learning self-control dynamic environments reinforcement learning |
| title | You don’t want to know what you’re missing: When information about forgone rewards impedes dynamic decision making |
| title_full | You don’t want to know what you’re missing: When information about forgone rewards impedes dynamic decision making |
| title_fullStr | You don’t want to know what you’re missing: When information about forgone rewards impedes dynamic decision making |
| title_full_unstemmed | You don’t want to know what you’re missing: When information about forgone rewards impedes dynamic decision making |
| title_short | You don’t want to know what you’re missing: When information about forgone rewards impedes dynamic decision making |
| title_sort | you don t want to know what you re missing when information about forgone rewards impedes dynamic decision making |
| topic | decision-making delay of gratification learning self-control dynamic environments reinforcement learning |
| url | https://www.cambridge.org/core/product/identifier/S1930297500001984/type/journal_article |
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