Abstract
Studies in the field of psychology often employ (computerised) behavioural tasks, aimed at mimicking real-world situations that elicit certain actions in participants. Such tasks are for example used to study risk propensity, a trait-like tendency towards taking or avoiding risk. One of the most popular tasks for gauging risk propensity is the Balloon Analogue Risk Task (BART; Lejuez et al., 2002), which has been shown to relate well to self-reported risk-taking and to real-world risk behaviours. However, despite its popularity and qualities, the BART has several methodological shortcomings, most of which have been reported before, but none of which are widely known. In the present paper, four such problems are explained and elaborated on: a lack of clarity as to whether decisions are characterised by uncertainty or risk; censoring of observations; confounding of risk and expected value; and poor decomposability into adaptive and maladaptive risk behaviour. Furthermore, for every problem, a range of possible solutions is discussed, which overall can be divided into three categories: using a different, more informative outcome index than the standard average pump score; modifying one or more task elements; or using a different task, either an alternative risk-taking task (sequential or otherwise), or a custom-made instrument. It is important to make use of these solutions, as applying the BART without accounting for its shortcomings may lead to interpretational problems, including false positive and false negative results. Depending on the research aims of a given study, certain shortcomings are more pressing than others, indicating the (type of) solutions most needed. By combining solutions and openly discussing shortcomings, researchers may be able to modify the BART in such a way that it can operationalise risk propensity without substantial methodological problems.
Highlights
To a large extent, psychological science rests on the promises of operationalisation: defining fuzzy concepts as measurable variables, or in other words, Received: 8 June 2020, Accepted: 31 August 2020, Published: 8 October 2020 https://www.jtrialerror.com 1Manuscript by D G changing conceptual variables into operational ones (Shuttleworth, 2008)
Despite its popularity and qualities, the Balloon Analogue Risk Task (BART) has several methodological shortcomings, most of which have been reported before, but none of which are widely known. Four such problems are explained and elaborated on: a lack of clarity as to whether decisions are characterised by uncertainty or risk; censoring of observations; confounding of risk and expected value; and poor decomposability into adaptive and maladaptive risk behaviour
For every problem, a range of possible solutions is discussed, which overall can be divided into three categories: using a di erent, more informative outcome index than the standard average pump score; modifying one or more task elements; or using a di erent task, either an alternative risk-taking task, or a custom-made instrument
Summary
Psychological science rests on the promises of operationalisation: defining fuzzy concepts as measurable variables, or in other words, Received: 8 June 2020, Accepted: 31 August 2020, Published: 8 October 2020 https://www.jtrialerror.com 1. One way in which risk-taking is operationalised in these fields is through self-report measures, such as the Domain-Specific Risk-Taking (DOSPERT) scale (Blais & Weber, 2006) and the Financial Risk Tolerance assessment (Grable & Lytton, 1999) Another way is through computerised behavioural tasks, like the Iowa Gambling Task (Bechara, Damasio, Damasio, & Anderson, 1994), the Cambridge Gambling Task (Rogers et al, 1999), the Game of Dice Task (Brand et al, 2005), the Balloon Analogue Risk Task (Lejuez et al, 2002), and the more recent but already widely used Columbia Card Task (Figner, Mackinglay, Wilkening, & Weber, 2009). If a task is a poor proxy for a concept or is subject to methodological or interpretational problems, any data resulting from it are of limited value to our understanding of the concept In this regard, several studies have challenged the operationalisation ability of the most-cited risk task, the Iowa Gambling Task (see e.g. Brand, Labudda, & Markowitsch, 2006; Buelow & Suhr, 2009; Figner et al, 2009; Maia & McClelland, 2004).
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