Choice Certainty Research Articles

Neurocomputational Mechanisms Underlying Differential Reinforcement Learning From Wins and Losses in Obesity With and Without Binge Eating

BackgroundBinge-eating disorder (BED) is thought of as a disorder of cognitive control, but evidence regarding its neurocognitive mechanisms is inconclusive. Key limitations of previous research include a lack of consistent separation between effects of BED and obesity and a disregard for self-report evidence suggesting that neurocognitive alterations may emerge primarily in loss- or harm-avoidance contexts. MethodsTo address these gaps, in this longitudinal study we investigated behavioral flexibility and its underlying neurocomputational processes in reward-seeking and loss-avoidance contexts. Obese participants with BED, obese participants without BED, and healthy normal-weight participants (n = 96) performed a probabilistic reversal learning task during functional imaging, with different blocks focused on obtaining wins or avoiding losses. They were reinvited for a 6-month follow-up assessment. ResultsAnalyses informed by computational models of reinforcement learning showed that unlike obese participants with BED, obese participants without BED performed worse in the win than in the loss condition. Computationally, this was explained by differential learning sensitivities in the win versus loss conditions in the groups. In the brain, this was echoed in differential neural learning signals in the ventromedial prefrontal cortex per condition. The differences were subtle but scaled with BED symptoms, such that more severe BED symptoms were associated with increasing bias toward improved learning from wins versus losses. Across conditions, obese participants with BED switched more between choice options than healthy normal-weight participants. This was reflected in diminished representation of choice certainty in the ventromedial prefrontal cortex. ConclusionsOur study highlights the importance of distinguishing between obesity with and without BED to identify unique neurocomputational alterations underlying different styles of maladaptive eating behavior.

Categorization Patterns of Career Plan Choice Based on Demographic Characteristics of Teacher Education Students

This study aims to describe the pattern of categorization of the certainty of career plan choices for educational program students and its relationship with their demographic characteristics. Respondents totaled 377 people (male = 176 and famale = 201) who were drawn randomly from a number of education program students at the University of Lampung. Data on the certainty of students' career plan choices is collected through the CCCS (Career Choice Certainty Scale). The research found that in general the categorization of the certainty of education students' career plan choices is patterned Quite Certain, Not Certain, Certain, Very Certain, Uncertain, and Very Uncertain. In detail, the pattern of categorization of the certainty of students' career plan choices varies according to the grouping of their demographic characteristics (gender: male and female, place of residence: urban and suburban, study program: scientific and social, and family socio-economic status: high, medium, low). The results of examining the relationship between the categorization of the certainty of career plans and students' demographic characteristics, it turns out that where they live, the chosen study program, and the socio-economic status of students' families are significantly related to the certainty of their career choice plans, although the strength of the relationship between these variables is categorized as weak. Meanwhile, the student gender variable was not significantly related to the certainty of their career choice plans.

The effect of sleep deprivation on food choice certainty: a pilot study

The effect of sleep deprivation on food choice certainty: a pilot study

Datafication Markers: Curation and User Network Effects on Mobilization and Polarization During Elections

Social media platforms are crucial sources of political information during election campaigns, with datafication processes underlying the algorithmic curation of newsfeeds. Recognizing the role of individuals in shaping datafication processes and leveraging the metaphor of news attraction, we study the impact of user curation and networks on mobilization and polarization. In a two-wave online panel survey (<em>n</em> = 943) conducted during the 2021 German federal elections, we investigate the influence of self-reported user decisions, such as following politicians, curating their newsfeed, and being part of politically interested networks, on changes in five democratic key variables: vote choice certainty, campaign participation, turnout, issue reinforcement, and affective polarization. Our findings indicate a mobilizing rather than polarizing effect of algorithmic election news exposure and highlight the relevance of users’ political networks on algorithmic platforms.

Will information interventions affect public preferences and willingness to pay for air quality improvement? An empirical study based on deliberative choice experiment

Environmental information is a prerequisite for public participation in air quality improvement, and the choice of such participation behavior is influenced by the intervention of environmental information. Nonetheless, there has been insufficient analysis of how information interventions affect public preferences and willingness to pay for air quality improvement. The combination of deliberative and choice experiment is used to explore the importance of information interventions for public participation in air quality improvement, and the changes in public preferences and willingness to pay for air quality improvement before and after information interventions are compared to analyze the impact of information interventions on evaluation results of air quality value. The results suggest that information interventions do alter the preferences and willingness of the public to pay for air quality improvement, significantly increasing the choice certainty of respondents and decreasing the protest response. In addition, women and high-income groups showed a stronger willingness to improve air quality after the information interventions, with 35.15 CNY, 44.07 CNY and 46.75 CNY increases in willingness to pay for improved urban green coverage rate, fewer haze days and reduced morbidity. The combination of deliberative information interventions and choice experiment will help improve the effectiveness of air quality value evaluation, stimulate public environmental awareness and willingness to participate, and the results will aid government environmental management.

Do Self-Assessments for Informed Study Decisions Actually Inform Study Decisions? A Model for Evaluating the Consequential Validity Aspect

Pre-enrolment self-assessments are a promising way to address student commitment and retention in an early stage. Such assessments aim to inform study decisions by evoking reflection and providing advice for further preparation. Though these assessments require a solid validation process, so far the consequential validity aspect tends to be ignored. To address this gap, the current study investigates self-assessment impact on study choice certainty and enrolment as well as self-assessment fairness. Prospective students (N = 662) orienting towards studying in higher online education took a self-assessment consisting of six subtests. The impact appeared in line with the assessment's purpose for 68.9% of the prospective students: their study choice certainty was adapted or remained unchanged in accordance with their obtained scores. Study choice certainty after the self-assessment related positively to enrolment probability. Additionally, the impact appeared fair (similar across subgroups), though men's study choice certainty appeared relatively robust against unfavourable scores.

Career decision-making in unemployed Portuguese adults: Test of the social cognitive model of career self-management.

Most research applications of the social cognitive model of career self-management (CSM; Lent & Brown, 2013) to career exploration and decision-making have involved U.S. college students. To extend research on the model, we tested its fit to the data in a sample of 345 unemployed adult workers in Portugal. Participants completed measures of career decision self-efficacy, outcome expectations, social support, conscientiousness, neuroticism, exploration goals, decisional stress, and career choice certainty. The model test yielded good overall fit to the data and accounted for significant variance in goals, stress, and choice certainty. When compared with prior findings, the results suggest that the CSM model may offer explanatory utility relative to the making of initial as well as subsequent career decisions and across national boundaries. Implications of the findings for the social cognitive model as well as for future research and practice are considered. (PsycInfo Database Record (c) 2022 APA, all rights reserved).

Sources of confidence in value-based choice

Confidence, the subjective estimate of decision quality, is a cognitive process necessary for learning from mistakes and guiding future actions. The origins of confidence judgments resulting from economic decisions remain unclear. We devise a task and computational framework that allowed us to formally tease apart the impact of various sources of confidence in value-based decisions, such as uncertainty emerging from encoding and decoding operations, as well as the interplay between gaze-shift dynamics and attentional effort. In line with canonical decision theories, trial-to-trial fluctuations in the precision of value encoding impact economic choice consistency. However, this uncertainty has no influence on confidence reports. Instead, confidence is associated with endogenous attentional effort towards choice alternatives and down-stream noise in the comparison process. These findings provide an explanation for confidence (miss)attributions in value-guided behaviour, suggesting mechanistic influences of endogenous attentional states for guiding decisions and metacognitive awareness of choice certainty.

Economic analysis of choices among differing measures to manage coastal erosion in Hoi An (a UNESCO World Heritage Site)

The paper presents one of the first economic analyses of residents’ choice of different coastal erosion control measures in a developing country — Vietnam. Hoi An, a UNESCO World Heritage Site, was selected given the frequency of coastal erosion events which have caused increasing damages to property, tourism activities and the livelihood of local people in an iconic tourist destination. We designed a discrete choice experiment based on responses from 399 households in order to estimate the willingness to pay (WTP) for differing coastal erosion control measures. Using the generalized multinomial logit model, empirical results yield five important findings. First, residents prefer wider, more public beaches having both trees and restaurants and are willing to accept visible structures such as groynes and stair revetment to prevent further erosion. Second, residents place a higher value on a beach that is protected by robust permanent structures. In particular, residents have the highest WTP for groynes. Third, there exists preference and scale heterogeneity across respondents which are driven by level of education, knowledge of the problem, and the stated level of choice certainty. Fourth, knowledge and experience of coastal erosion are shown to have a strong influence on the valuation residents place on the choice of protective structures. Finally, on average, a resident is willing to pay USD 1.7 per year for a coastal erosion management program that increases beach width by additional 50 meters, beach access by additional 25%, restaurants and trees on the beach and groynes as the erosion protection structure.

The added value of autobiographical reflexivity with persuasive technology for professional identities of Social Work students: a randomized controlled trial

ABSTRACT The added value of autobiographical reflexivity and persuasive technology (PT) compared to critical reflection was examined in a blended learning course. The main outcome measure was achieving a professional identity (PI). A Randomized Control Trial (RCT) was carried out with three measurement points (baseline, post-course, follow-up) and had three conditions: critical reflection; critical reflection and autobiographical reflexivity; critical reflection and autobiographical reflexivity integrated with PT. The study examined effectiveness (questionnaires, reflection reports), evaluations (focus groups) and persuasiveness (questionnaires) amongst 187 Dutch Bachelor Social Work students. There were no significant interaction effects between time and condition, however participants in all conditions improved significantly over time in their PI, choice certainty, social well-being and were stable in learning motivation, career reflection, drop-out threat, reminiscence, internal locus of control, emotional well-being and psychological well-being. Analysis of the reflection level through reflection reports showed no differences (critical reflection versus critical reflection combined with autobiographical reflexivity). The autobiographical reflexivity conditions showed more affective and cognitive involvement than critical reflection alone. The use of PT did not seem to have any effect. Autobiographical reflexivity combined with critical reflection appeared to be an equivalent option that participants appreciated more than solely critical reflection.

Beyond learning in higher education: an evaluation of the ‘Life Design’ initiative to improve student employability

ABSTRACT With increasing evidence highlighting the link between psychological factors such as self-esteem, self-efficacy and optimism on employability outcomes, this paper reports an evaluation of a unique student experience initiative called ‘Life Design’ developed to support the professional and personal development of undergraduate students. First year undergraduates engaged in a two-hour workshop involving interactive exercises designed to foster self-reflection, self-efficacy, and career optimism. The impact of this workshop on validated self-report measures of self-esteem, self-efficacy, and optimism, alongside career-related outcomes was explored using a prospective longitudinal design. Analyses revealed a significant immediate and sustained increase in self-esteem following Life Design, but no impact on self-efficacy or career optimism. Certainty of career developing steps increased at a later follow up, but no changes to career prospect confidence or career choice certainty were reported. This paper highlights the benefits and wider challenges of delivering and engaging students in initiatives designed to enhance employability.

Improve student career certainty using self-information

This study aims to examine the effectiveness of counseling interventions using self-information to increase student career certainty. This study was conducted with a quasi-experimental pre-test–post-test non-equivalent group design. The number of subjects was 94 high school students, out of which 44 were male and 50 were female; the experimental group consisted of 39 people and the control group consisted of 55 people. The Self-information used in this study was provided through the Self-Directed Career Exploration Inventory, while research data was obtained through the Career Plan Certainty Scale. The results showed that career counseling services using self-information were effective in helping high school students to increase their career choice certainty. The mean score of the students of the specialization group in the experimental group increased and was significantly different from the mean score of the students in the control group. In addition, the mean score for the study plans of male and female students was not significantly different.
 
 Keywords: Career certainty, self-information, career counseling, career intervention.

Artificial intelligence and the new forms of interaction: Who has the control when interacting with a chatbot?

Advances in artificial intelligence provide new tools of digital assistance that retailers can use to support consumers while shopping. The aim of this research is to examine how consumers react as a function of assistants’ appearance (human- vs. not human-like) and activation (automatic vs. human-initiated). We advance a model of sequential mediation whose empirical validation on 400 participants in two studies shows that non-anthropomorphic digital assistants lead to higher psychological reactance. In turn, reactance affects perceived choice difficulty, which positively reflects on choice certainty, perceived performance and—ultimately—satisfaction. Thus, although reactance might appear as a negative outcome, it eventually leads to higher satisfaction. Furthermore, initiation (system vs. user initiation) does not activate the chain of effects, but significantly interacts with anthropomorphism so that individuals exhibit lower reactance when confronted with human-like digital assistants activated by the consumer. Overall, reactance is highest for non-human like digital assistants that are computer-initiated.

Benefit-Risk or Risk-Benefit Trade-Offs? Another Look at Attribute Ordering Effects in a Pilot Choice Experiment.

Studies recommend randomising the order of attributes in discrete choice experiments (DCEs) to avoid bias; however, in a benefit-risk setting, this may increase the cognitive burden of respondents who compare the benefits and risks of treatments, or may affect their decision-making process. Based on these concerns, this paper explored attribute ordering effects in a benefit-risk DCE. Attribute ordering effects were explored in a large pilot DCE relating to the medical treatment of insomnia. Participants were randomised to one of three presentation orders: (1) benefits were presented before risks (BR); (2) risks were presented before benefits (RB); (3) all attributes were randomised (RN). For the RB and BR presentation orders, attributes were randomised within benefits and risks. Responses were assessed in three ways. First, variations in respondents' self-reported choice certainty were obtained. Second, variations in failure rates of stability and dominance tests were calculated. Third, a heteroscedastic error component model tested for differences in choice consistency across the three attribute orderings. The final analysis included 156 respondents (RN: 54; BR: 49; RB: 53). No differences were found between the presentation orders with respect to stated choice certainty, or the proportion of respondents failing either the dominance or stability test. However, deterministic attribute grouping was associated with higher choice consistency. To increase choice consistency, DCE attributes should be randomised within logical groups that may be further randomised to reduce the risk of ordering effects.

Mimicking Real-Life Decision Making in Health: Allowing Respondents Time to Think in a Discrete Choice Experiment.

To empirically test the impact of allowing respondents time to think (TTT) about their choice options on the outcomes of a discrete choice experiments (DCE). In total, 613 participants of the Swedish CArdioPulmonary bioImage Study (SCAPIS) completed a DCE questionnaire that measured their preferences for receiving secondary findings of a genetic test. A Bayesian D-efficient design with 60 choice tasks divided over 4 questionnaires was used. Each choice task contained 2 scenarios with 4 attributes: type of disease, disease penetrance probability, preventive opportunities, and effectiveness of prevention. Respondents were randomly allocated to the TTT or no TTT (NTTT) sample. Latent class models (LCMs) were estimated to determine attribute-level values and their relative importance. In addition, choice certainty, attribute-level interpretation, choice consistency, and potential uptake rates were compared between samples. In the TTT sample, 92% of the respondents (245 of 267) indicated they used the TTT period to (1) read the information they received (72%) and (2) discuss with their family (24%). In both samples, respondents were very certain about their choices. A 3-class LCM was fitted for both samples. Preference reversals were found for 3 of the 4 attributes in one class in the NTTT sample (34% class-membership probability). Relative importance scores of the attributes differed between the 2 samples, and significant scale effects indicating higher choice consistency in TTT sample were found. Offering respondents TTT influences decision making and preferences. Developers of future DCEs regarding complex health-related decisions are advised to consider this approach to enhance the validity of the elicited preferences.

Choice certainty and deliberative thinking in discrete choice experiments. A theoretical and empirical investigation

Resource allocation decisions require information about individuals' preferences for goods and services. Survey based stated preference methods, such as discrete choice experiments (DCEs), are used to elicit preferences for non-market goods. A critique of stated preference research is that respondents to hypothetical surveys may not provide careful and thoughtful responses that reveal rational preferences. Choice certainty has been used to measure survey respondents' task engagement. Researchers assume that respondents who are certain about their choices provide deliberative responses. In the case of DCE, we argue that the variability of choice certainty is also important. We present a novel framework to identify thoughtful / deliberative respondents. The framework combines respondents’ certainty with their variability in certainty across a set of choice tasks. We test our framework empirically using data from two case studies. We find respondents with higher mean certainty and variability (i) seldom use decision heuristics, (ii) are more likely to have monotonic preferences, (iii) have longer response times, (iv) make choices that have higher interval validity, and (v) have higher choice consistency. We discuss the relevance of alternative ex-post calibration strategies with a view to improve the precision and accuracy of DCE-based welfare estimates.

The Virtual-Environment-Foraging Task enables rapid training and single-trial metrics of rule acquisition and reversal in head-fixed mice

Behavioural flexibility is an essential survival skill, yet our understanding of its neuronal substrates is still limited. While mouse research offers unique tools to dissect the neuronal circuits involved, the measurement of flexible behaviour in mice often suffers from long training times, poor experimental control, and temporally imprecise binary (hit/miss) performance readouts. Here we present a virtual-environment task for mice that tackles these limitations. It offers fast training of vision-based rule reversals (~100 trials per reversal) with full stimulus control and continuous behavioural readouts. By generating multiple non-binary performance metrics per trial, it provides single-trial estimates not only of response accuracy and speed, but also of underlying processes like choice certainty and alertness (discussed in detail in a companion paper). Based on these metrics, we show that mice can predict new task rules long before they are able to execute them, and that this delay varies across animals. We also provide and validate single-trial estimates of whether an error was committed with or without awareness of the task rule. By tracking in unprecedented detail the cognitive dynamics underlying flexible behaviour, this task enables new investigations into the neuronal interactions that shape behavioural flexibility moment by moment.

The Virtual-Environment-Foraging Task enables rapid training and single-trial metrics of attention in head-fixed mice

Attention – the flexible allocation of processing resources based on behavioural demands – is essential to survival. Mouse research offers unique tools to dissect the underlying pathways, but is hampered by the difficulty of accurately measuring attention in mice. Current attention tasks for mice face several limitations: Binary (hit/miss), temporally imprecise metrics, behavioural confounds and overtraining. Thus, despite the increasing scope of neuronal population measurements, insights are limited without equally precise behavioural measures. Here we present a virtual-environment task for head-fixed mice based on ‘foraging-like’ navigation. The task requires animals to discriminate gratings at orientation differences from 90° to 5°, and can be learned in only 3–5 sessions (<550 trials). It yields single-trial, non-binary metrics of response speed and accuracy, which generate secondary metrics of choice certainty, visual acuity, and most importantly, of sustained and cued attention – two attentional components studied extensively in humans. This allows us to examine single-trial dynamics of attention in mice, independently of confounds like rule learning. With this approach, we show that C57/BL6 mice have better visual acuity than previously measured, that they rhythmically alternate between states of high and low alertness, and that they can be prompted to adopt different performance strategies using minute changes in reward contingencies.

Incorporating Certainty and Attribute Non-Attendance in Choice Experiments: An Application to Valuation of Coastal Habitat

Due to their non-market characteristics, coastal habitats are often valued using stated preference methods, such as discrete choice experiments. An extensive literature cautions the confounding influence of both choice complexity and hypothetical bias in these types of welfare analyses. In response, researchers have developed a variety of ex post controls to reduce the influence of potential biases. This study utilizes a discrete choice experiment with the goal of measuring residents and visitors’ willingness-to-pay for estuarine habitat and access in the Sarasota Bay Estuary watershed. Our application examines model calibration to address two important issues in the empirical literature: 1) reported choice certainty and 2) stated attribute non-attendance. We examine choice certainty by focusing on recalibrating data to account for uncertain choices by jointly modeling choice and certainty. We also account for stated attribute attendance and non-attendance and compare results with more standard models. Our results indicate that accounting for attribute non-attendance and choice certainty have minor effects on coefficient estimates, generally leading to a small reduction in the marginal utilities for coastal habitat and a small increase in the marginal utility of income. The more apparent influence of these approaches comes via smaller standard errors. These approaches result in slightly lower estimates of marginal-willingness-to-pay (WTP), suggesting that accounting for uncertainty may ameliorate hypothetical bias but they also provide more precise estimates. Results from our preferred model indicate respondents are willing to pay between $1.50 to $2.06 for an additional acre of wetlands, $0.54 to $4.55 for an acre of oyster habitat, $0.57 to $2.28 for an acre of seagrass, $0.09 to $ 0.32 for an additional artificial reef dome, and $ 2.87 to $ 7.18 for an additional ecological park. Uncertain respondents exhibit WTP that are not statistically different than $0.

Choice certainty, consistency, and monotonicity in discrete choice experiments

ABSTRACTThis study investigates choice certainty, choice consistency, and choice monotonicity and their underlying common and idiosyncratic determinants in discrete choice experiments. We test the equality of choice behaviour between respondents who differ with respect to these concepts. Our results suggest that there are significant differences in the choice behaviour between certain and uncertain, as well as consistent and inconsistent, respondents. The hypothesis of equality of choice behaviour between samples with and without a self-reported choice certainty follow-up question cannot be rejected. We identify a variety of idiosyncratic determinants of choice certainty, consistency, and monotonicity, but only the time spent reading informational pages and gender are identified as common drivers. We find that female respondents are less certain about their choices, but display a higher degree of monotonicity and consistency in their choice behaviour.