Risky Decision Making Under Stressful Conditions: Men and Women With Smaller Cortisol Elevations Make Riskier Social and Economic Decisions.

Anna J Dreyer,Kevin G F Thomas,Dale Stephen,Leanne Adams,W Jake Jacobs,Aimee O'Neill,Tarah L Swanepoel,Robyn Human

doi:10.3389/fpsyg.2022.810031

Anna J Dreyer, Kevin G F Thomas + Show 6 more

Open Access

https://doi.org/10.3389/fpsyg.2022.810031

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Abstract

Men often make riskier decisions than women across a wide range of real-life behaviors. Whether this sex difference is accentuated, diminished, or stable under stressful conditions is, however, contested in the scientific literature. A critical blind spot lies amid this contestation: Most studies use standardized, laboratory-based, cognitive measures of decision making rather than complex real-life social simulation tasks to assess risk-related behavior. To address this blind spot, we investigated the effects of acute psychosocial stress on risk decision making in men and women (N = 80) using a standardized cognitive measure (the Iowa Gambling Task; IGT) and a novel task that simulated a real-life social situation (an online chatroom in which participants interacted with other men and women in sexually suggestive scenarios). Participants were exposed to either an acute psychosocial stressor or an equivalent control condition. Stressor-exposed participants were further characterized as high- or low-cortisol responders. Results confirmed that the experimental manipulation was effective. On the IGT, participants characterized as low-cortisol responders (as well as those in the Non-Stress group) made significantly riskier decisions than those characterized as high-cortisol responders. Similarly, in the online chatroom, participants characterized as low-cortisol responders (but not those characterized as high-cortisol responders) were, relative to those in the Non-Stress group, significantly more likely to make risky decisions. Together, these results suggest that at lower levels of cortisol both men and women tend to make riskier decisions in both economic and social spheres.

Highlights

Men tend to make riskier decisions than women across a wide range of real-life situations (Byrnes et al, 1999; d’Acremont and Van der Linden, 2006; Charness and Gneezy, 2012; Georgiou et al, 2018; Sidlauskaite et al, 2018)
The present study investigated effects of exposure to an acute psychosocial stressor, as marked by elevated cortisol levels, on risky decision making by healthy young men and women on a standardized laboratory-based measure and in novel task that simulated a real-life social situation
On a standardized laboratory measure of risk decision making, both men and women characterized as low-cortisol responders made significantly riskier decisions than those characterized as high-cortisol responders

Summary

Introduction

Men tend to make riskier decisions than women across a wide range of real-life situations (Byrnes et al, 1999; d’Acremont and Van der Linden, 2006; Charness and Gneezy, 2012; Georgiou et al, 2018; Sidlauskaite et al, 2018). After exposure to laboratoryinduced acute psychosocial stressors, men tend to make risky decisions whereas women tend to make safer, more risk-averse decisions (Preston et al, 2007; Lighthall et al, 2009, 2012; van den Bos et al, 2009, 2014; Mather and Lighthall, 2012; Daughters et al, 2013; Alacreu-Crespo et al, 2019). After exposure to laboratory-induced acute psychosocial stressors, men (Fairchild et al, 2009), but not women (Cahlíková and Cingl, 2017), tend to make safer, more risk-averse decisions.

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