̽��ֱ�� of Cambridge - social-neuroscience

̽��ֱ��price of a happy ending can be bad decision-making, say researchers

fpjl2 — Wed, 10 Jun 2015 13:09:51 +0000

New research using high-speed gambling experiments shows that, for most of us, the last experience we’ve had can be the defining one when it comes to taking a decision, coming at the expense of other experiences we’ve accumulated further back in time.

̽��ֱ��study, published today in the journal Proceedings of the Royal Society B, supports the idea that the ‘banker’s fallacy’ - focusing on immediate growth at the expense of longer-term stability that would produce better results - is intuitive in the way many of us make quick decisions.

People's natural inclination towards a ‘happy ending’ means that we often ascribe greater value to experiences than they are worth, say researchers. We end up overvaluing experiences with a final uptick over those that taper at the last minute, despite being of equal or even lesser overall value, and making our next moves on that basis.

Writing in the journal, they use the analogy of a three-course dinner: it has mediocre starter, a fine main, and an excellent dessert. This will be viewed much more favourably - and have much more weight in any future decision - than the inverse: an excellent starter and ending with a mediocre dessert, despite the fact that overall both experiences share equal value.

Researchers say that the computational demand to try and factor in all experiences equally would be vast, so our brain constantly updates its internal ‘logbook’ as we go, with each new experience being condensed and then ranked against the previous few for context. Then, a new experience only has to be judged against the running total.

However, a ‘temporal markdown’ comes into play, meaning that the further back an experience, even if still quite recent, the less weight it carries in the next decision despite its relevant value; the most immediate experiences carry much more weight in decision-making than they should - meaning a recent ‘happy ending’ has a hugely disproportionate influence, say researchers.

They say that a wealth of information and experience “leaks” as a result of this cognitive mechanism, leading to false and delusional beliefs that cause wrong-headed and often short-term decision-making despite historical experience that should convince us of the contrary.

Yet a small number of those tested (nine of the 41 participants) were able to maintain an almost perfect capacity to recall previous experience accurately, without the markdown of past experiences, and make solid long-term decisions as a result - almost as if they were “looking down on time” said lead author Dr Martin Vestergaard.

“Most people we tested fall foul of the ‘banker’s fallacy’, and make poor short-term decisions as a result. This may be because they struggle to access historical experience, or give it the correct value, but we also think they become overly impressed with the moment to moment fluctuation of experiences,” said Vestergaard, from Cambridge ̽��ֱ��’s Department of Physiology, Development and Neuroscience.

“While the majority of participants made decisions based only on very or most recent events, a minority were able to maintain a seemingly perfect ability - at least within the parameters of the experiment - to see time on an equal footing, unconstrained by the myopia inherent in the decision-making of most,” he said.

“ ̽��ֱ��next stages of our research will be to use imaging techniques to look at whether this ability is linked to certain parts of the brain, or perhaps social conditioning such as age and education.”

Vestergaard did question age and occupation for the initial study, and found no correlation between those who are older, or who have a more or less technical occupation, with this panoptical ability to flatten time, but says the current sample size is too small to draw conclusions.

̽��ֱ��experiment involved participants trying to accumulate money by gambling between two sets of gold coins of varying sizes at high reactions times so participants were forced to go on memory and instinct.

Research using gambling techniques shows that even very recent experiences carry a ‘temporal markdown’ so that those more immediate carry disproportionate weight in decision-making, meaning that a ‘happy ending’ can wildly skew what we think we should do next over what experience would tell us.

A minority were able to maintain a seemingly perfect ability - at least within the parameters of the experiment - to see time on an equal footing

Martin Vestergaard

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Aesop’s Fable unlocks how we think

bjb42 — Thu, 26 Jul 2012 20:00:52 +0000

Lucy Cheke, a PhD student at the ̽��ֱ�� of Cambridge’s Department of Experimental Psychology, expanded Aesop’s fable into three tasks of varying complexity and compared the performance of Eurasian Jays with local school children.

̽��ֱ��task that set the children apart from the Jays involved a mechanism which was counter-intuitive as it was hidden under an opaque surface. Neither the birds nor the children were able to learn how the mechanism worked, but the children were able to learn how to get the reward, whereas the birds were not.

̽��ֱ��results of the study illustrate that children learn about cause and effect in the physical world in a different way to birds. While the Jays appear to take account of the mechanism involved in the task, the children are more driven by simple cause-effect relationships.

Lucy Cheke said, ”This makes sense because it is children’s job to learn about new cause-and-effect relationships without being limited by ideas of what is or is not possible. ̽��ֱ��children were able to learn what to do to get the reward even if the chain-of-events was apparently impossible. Essentially, they were able to ignore the fact that it shouldn’t be happening to concentrate on the fact that it was happening. ̽��ֱ��birds however, found it much harder to learn what was happening because they were put off by the fact that it shouldn’t be happening.”

̽��ֱ��tasks were a variation of Aesop’s fable that consisted of using a tube of water containing an out-of-reach prize. ̽��ֱ��subjects were required to use objects to displace the water so that the prize could be reached.

̽��ֱ��first task involved two tubes, one filled with a prize amongst sawdust while the other tube contained a prize floating out of reach in water. ̽��ֱ��subject was presented with objects and was to choose which tube with which to drop the objects into: the sawdust or the water. Dropping objects into the tube containing sawdust obviously did not raise the level of the prize, whereas dropping the objects into the tube containing water created displacement and raised the prize within the reach of the subject.

̽��ֱ��second task involved only one tube of water with a floating prize, but the subject was given a choice of what type of object to drop into the tube: an object that floats or another that sinks.

̽��ֱ��final task presented the subject with an apparatus that consisted of one u-shaped tube with a wide arm and one narrow arm, and one single straight tube. These were imbedded in an opaque base so that the joining of the U-tube was hidden and the apparatus appeared to consist of two identical wide tubes with a narrow tube between them. Both the u-tube and the straight tube were filled with water such that the level was equal between them. ̽��ֱ��prize was inside the narrow arm of the u-tube, too narrow for the subject to insert an object to create displacement. Therefore, the subject was forced to pick one of the wider tubes on either side. If they picked the Wide arm of the u-tube, then the level of the prize would rise, but if they picked the single tube, it would not. Because the join of the u-tube was hidden, it appeared to the subjects as if dropping an item in one tube caused the level of water in a different tube to rise: which is impossible.

̽��ֱ��birds were unable to complete this task, whereas the children performed at the same level as in the previous tasks, easily determining which tube raised the level of the water through trial and error.

Lucy added, “ ̽��ֱ��Aesop's fable paradigm provides an incredibly useful means by which to compare cause and effect learning with understanding of underlying mechanisms, i.e. folk physics. We are planning on extending this paradigm to really try to understand what’s going on in the heads of adults, children and animals when they deal with problems in the physical world.”

Lucy continued, “We would like to thank the staff, children and parents at Godmanchester Community Primary School for taking part in the study”.

̽��ֱ��study entitled: How do Children solve Aesop’s Fable? Is published today (July 25th) in PLoS ONE.

Cambridge scientists have used an age-old fable to help illustrate how we think differently to other animals.

̽��ֱ��Aesops fable paradigm provides an incredibly useful means by which to compare cause-effect learning with understanding of underlying mechanisms, i.e. folk physics.

Lucy Cheke

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