The delay-reward heuristic: What do people expect in intertemporal choice tasks?
Recent research has shown that risk and reward are positively correlated in many environments, and that people have internalized this association as a “risk-reward heuristic”: when making choices based on incomplete information, people infer probabilities from payoffs and vice-versa, and these infer...
| Main Authors: | , , , , |
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| Format: | Article |
| Language: | English |
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Cambridge University Press
2020-09-01
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| Series: | Judgment and Decision Making |
| Subjects: | |
| Online Access: | https://www.cambridge.org/core/product/identifier/S193029750000783X/type/journal_article |
| _version_ | 1827828214870835200 |
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| author | William J. Skylark Kieran T. F. Chan George D. Farmer Kai W. Gaskin Amelia R. Miller |
| author_facet | William J. Skylark Kieran T. F. Chan George D. Farmer Kai W. Gaskin Amelia R. Miller |
| author_sort | William J. Skylark |
| collection | DOAJ |
| description | Recent research has shown that risk and reward are positively correlated in many environments, and that people have internalized this association as a “risk-reward heuristic”: when making choices based on incomplete information, people infer probabilities from payoffs and vice-versa, and these inferences shape their decisions. We extend this work by examining people’s expectations about another fundamental trade-off — that between monetary reward and delay. In 2 experiments (total N = 670), we adapted a paradigm previously used to demonstrate the risk-reward heuristic. We presented participants with intertemporal choice tasks in which either the delayed reward or the length of the delay was obscured. Participants inferred larger rewards for longer stated delays, and longer delays for larger stated rewards; these inferences also predicted people’s willingness to take the delayed option. In exploratory analyses, we found that older participants inferred longer delays and smaller rewards than did younger ones. All of these results replicated in 2 large-scale pre-registered studies with participants from a different population (total N = 2138). Our results suggest that people expect intertemporal choice tasks to offer a trade-off between delay and reward, and differ in their expectations about this trade-off. This “delay-reward heuristic” offers a new perspective on existing models of intertemporal choice and provides new insights into unexplained and systematic individual differences in the willingness to delay gratification. |
| first_indexed | 2024-03-12T03:46:49Z |
| format | Article |
| id | doaj.art-b58c8a86fe1348f2a6e7620da1392633 |
| institution | Directory Open Access Journal |
| issn | 1930-2975 |
| language | English |
| last_indexed | 2024-03-12T03:46:49Z |
| publishDate | 2020-09-01 |
| publisher | Cambridge University Press |
| record_format | Article |
| series | Judgment and Decision Making |
| spelling | doaj.art-b58c8a86fe1348f2a6e7620da13926332023-09-03T12:43:27ZengCambridge University PressJudgment and Decision Making1930-29752020-09-011561162910.1017/S193029750000783XThe delay-reward heuristic: What do people expect in intertemporal choice tasks?William J. Skylark0Kieran T. F. Chan1George D. Farmer2Kai W. Gaskin3Amelia R. Miller4Department of Psychology, University of CambridgeDepartment of Psychology, University of CambridgeDivision of Neuroscience & Experimental Psychology, University of ManchesterDepartment of Psychology, University of CambridgeDepartment of Psychology, University of CambridgeRecent research has shown that risk and reward are positively correlated in many environments, and that people have internalized this association as a “risk-reward heuristic”: when making choices based on incomplete information, people infer probabilities from payoffs and vice-versa, and these inferences shape their decisions. We extend this work by examining people’s expectations about another fundamental trade-off — that between monetary reward and delay. In 2 experiments (total N = 670), we adapted a paradigm previously used to demonstrate the risk-reward heuristic. We presented participants with intertemporal choice tasks in which either the delayed reward or the length of the delay was obscured. Participants inferred larger rewards for longer stated delays, and longer delays for larger stated rewards; these inferences also predicted people’s willingness to take the delayed option. In exploratory analyses, we found that older participants inferred longer delays and smaller rewards than did younger ones. All of these results replicated in 2 large-scale pre-registered studies with participants from a different population (total N = 2138). Our results suggest that people expect intertemporal choice tasks to offer a trade-off between delay and reward, and differ in their expectations about this trade-off. This “delay-reward heuristic” offers a new perspective on existing models of intertemporal choice and provides new insights into unexplained and systematic individual differences in the willingness to delay gratification.https://www.cambridge.org/core/product/identifier/S193029750000783X/type/journal_articledelay discountingrisk-reward heuristicdelay-reward heuristicdecision-makingintertemporal choice |
| spellingShingle | William J. Skylark Kieran T. F. Chan George D. Farmer Kai W. Gaskin Amelia R. Miller The delay-reward heuristic: What do people expect in intertemporal choice tasks? Judgment and Decision Making delay discounting risk-reward heuristic delay-reward heuristic decision-making intertemporal choice |
| title | The delay-reward heuristic: What do people expect in intertemporal choice tasks? |
| title_full | The delay-reward heuristic: What do people expect in intertemporal choice tasks? |
| title_fullStr | The delay-reward heuristic: What do people expect in intertemporal choice tasks? |
| title_full_unstemmed | The delay-reward heuristic: What do people expect in intertemporal choice tasks? |
| title_short | The delay-reward heuristic: What do people expect in intertemporal choice tasks? |
| title_sort | delay reward heuristic what do people expect in intertemporal choice tasks |
| topic | delay discounting risk-reward heuristic delay-reward heuristic decision-making intertemporal choice |
| url | https://www.cambridge.org/core/product/identifier/S193029750000783X/type/journal_article |
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