Abstract
In theory, intuitive decisions are made immediately, without conscious, reasoned thought. They are experienced as decisions based on hunches that cannot be explicitly described but, nevertheless, guide subsequent action. Investigating the underlying neural mechanisms, previous research has found the orbitofrontal cortex (OFC) to be crucial to intuitive processes, but its specific role has remained unclear. On the basis of a two-stage conceptualization of intuition suggested by Bowers, Regehr, Balthazard, and Parker Cognitive Psychology, 22, 72-110 (1990), we attempt to clarify the OFC’s role in intuitive processing. We propose that it functions as an early integrator of incomplete stimulus input guiding subsequent processing by means of a coarse representation of the gist of the information. On the subjective level, this representation would be perceived as a (gut) feeling biasing the decision. Our aim in the present study was to test this neural model and rule out alternative explanations of OFC activation in intuitive judgments. We used magnetoencephalography (MEG) to record participants' electromagnetic brain responses during a visual coherence judgment task. As in earlier studies, the OFC was found to be activated when participants perceived coherence. Using MEG, it could be shown that this increase in activation began earlier in the OFC than in temporal object recognition areas. Moreover, the present study demonstrated that OFC activation was independent of physical stimulus characteristics, task requirements, and participants’ explicit recognition of the stimuli presented. These results speak to the OFC’s fundamental role in the early steps of intuitive judgments and suggest the proposed neural model as a promising starting point for future investigations.
Highlights
In everyday life, people commonly have to decide quickly between multiple alternatives, the potential consequences of which are often unpredictable
Behavioral results in several previous studies of this kind (e.g., Bowers et al, 1990; Luu et al, 2010; Volz & von Cramon, 2006), as well as those in the present study, revealed that participants were able to discriminate above chance between fragmented and scrambled stimuli. This result held true when participants stated that they were not able to name the object, which supports the assertion that the present task involves intuitive coherence judgments as defined by Bowers et al Such intuitive coherence judgments are based on a preliminary hunch arrived at without the actual nature of the coherence in question being reportable, at least at the time of judgment
Results suggest that orbitofrontal cortex (OFC) activation in coherence judgments is linked to an initial feeling of coherence that guides subsequent decision and action
Summary
People commonly have to decide quickly between multiple alternatives, the potential consequences of which are often unpredictable. Everyday-life decisions are often made on the basis of incomplete stimulus information, and usually within time limitations Such “decisions under uncertainty” stand in contrast to so-called “decisions under risk,” in which all possible alternatives and outcomes, as well as their probabilities, are known (Knight, 1921). In order to deal with decisions under uncertainty in real-life situations, an individual needs to have rapid judgmental abilities that do not depend on a conscious thought process moving through all the steps of reasoning. These kinds of rapid judgments have been termed intuitive (e.g., Evans, 2008; Kruglanski & Gigerenzer, 2011).
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