The effect of?natural scenes?on?temporal and probability?discounting

Abstract

Event Abstract Back to Event The effect of natural scenes on temporal and probability discounting Frances Chodkiewicz1* and Stephen Provost1 1 Southern Cross University, Psychology, School of Health and Human Sciences, Australia Aims: It is claimed that viewing images of nature can reduce delay discounting, a measure of impulsive decision-making (Berry, Sweeney, Morath, Odum, & Jordan, 2014). However, these authors did not control for the effects of aesthetics, in that the natural scenes were attractive images while the urban scenes were unattractive. We sought to determine whether this effect would be replicated when aesthetic pleasantness is controlled for, and to extend this examination to probability discounting, a separate measure of impulsivity. Method: Participants (n = 312) viewed either nature or urban images that were aesthetically pleasing or unpleasing, and then completed a temporal and probability discounting task. Results: There was no significant difference in delay discounting between groups F(1,172) = .613, p = .607. Males discounted significantly less than females on temporal and probability discounting tasks F(1,300) = 6.795, p = .010; F(1,300) = 9.941, p = .002, respectively. Older individuals delay discount significantly less than younger individuals F(3,300) = 11.826, p < .001. Older individuals had significantly higher positive affect than younger individuals F(3,300) = 7.956, p < .001. Conclusions: The discounting functions obtained were consistent with previous studies. The results for age and gender on discounting contributes to discussion of these matters: While lower levels of impulsivity in older adults is perhaps to be expected, the gender effect obtained here is less easily explained. Contrary to Berry et al. (2014) we found no evidence for any effect of viewing natural scenes on discounting, regardless of their aesthetic properties. While this discrepancy could relate to the differences in methodology employed, it would suggest that the claims for an effect of natural scenes on impulsivity should be treated with caution. Keywords: aesthetics, nature, delay discounting, Probability discounting, Impulsive decision-making Conference: 12th Annual Psychology Research Conference, 2015, Coffs Harbour, Australia, 25 Sep - 26 Sep, 2015. Presentation Type: Research Topic: Psychology Citation: Chodkiewicz F and Provost S (2015). The effect of natural scenes on temporal and probability discounting. Front. Psychol. Conference Abstract: 12th Annual Psychology Research Conference, 2015. doi: 10.3389/conf.fpsyg.2015.66.00007 Copyright: The abstracts in this collection have not been subject to any Frontiers peer review or checks, and are not endorsed by Frontiers. They are made available through the Frontiers publishing platform as a service to conference organizers and presenters. The copyright in the individual abstracts is owned by the author of each abstract or his/her employer unless otherwise stated. Each abstract, as well as the collection of abstracts, are published under a Creative Commons CC-BY 4.0 (attribution) licence (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/) and may thus be reproduced, translated, adapted and be the subject of derivative works provided the authors and Frontiers are attributed. For Frontiers’ terms and conditions please see https://www.frontiersin.org/legal/terms-and-conditions. Received: 23 Sep 2015; Published Online: 23 Sep 2015. * Correspondence: Ms. Frances Chodkiewicz, Southern Cross University, Psychology, School of Health and Human Sciences, Coffs Harbour, NSW, 2450, Australia, f.chodkiewicz.10@student.scu.edu.au Login Required This action requires you to be registered with Frontiers and logged in. To register or login click here. Abstract Info Abstract The Authors in Frontiers Frances Chodkiewicz Stephen Provost Google Frances Chodkiewicz Stephen Provost Google Scholar Frances Chodkiewicz Stephen Provost PubMed Frances Chodkiewicz Stephen Provost Related Article in Frontiers Google Scholar PubMed Abstract Close Back to top Javascript is disabled. Please enable Javascript in your browser settings in order to see all the content on this page.