The influence of affect on sequential decision making.

Dr. Bettina von Helversen (Université de Bâle)

23 octobre 2012, 16h, Uni-Mail M5193

Many decisions are not made in cold blood, but involve affective processes. Recent research has shown that affect can change how people make decisions by influencing how information is processed. We investigated how affective states influence the decision process in sequential decision-making. In general our results suggest that in sequential decisions, affect serves as a cue if an option is good enough to be accepted. Positive affect increases the probability that an option is accepted leading to earlier choices. In contrast, negative affect decreases the probability that an option is accepted and thus increases the number of options that are considered before a choice is made. Moreover, affect can also influence the quality of decisions, because in many sequential choice problems the quality of the decision is closely linked to the number of options considered.