Chapter 4 - The Evolution of Our Preferences: Insights from Non-human Primates

Abstract

This chapter discusses how choice changes preferences in adult humans and the origins of choice-based preference reversals. If decision-making researchers knew that some experiences were likely to promote choice biases, they could intervene in ways that might promote better decision-making. A second domain where researchers have examined the origins of choice biases involves framing effects. Although classical economists may want to believe otherwise, real human decision-makers often make different choices depending on how a problem is described or framed. Specifically, they appear to work harder to avoid losses than they do to seek out correspondingly sized gains, a bias known as loss aversion. Loss aversion is evident in the above scenario insofar as people tend to take on more risk in an attempt to avoid experiencing any loss relative to their reference point. The early emergence of choice biases hints that such biases might persist in the face of extensive economic exposure or market disciplining.