Haewon Yoon

Student loans defer the cost of college until after graduation, allowing many students access to higher lifetime earnings and colleges and universities they otherwise could not afford. Even with student loans, however, the authors find that students psychologically realize the financial costs of a college education long before their loan repayments begin. This early cost realization frames financial decisions between most pairs of colleges as an intertemporal trade-off. Students choose between investments with (1) smaller short-term costs but smaller long-term returns (a lower-cost, lower-return [LC-LR] college) and (2) larger short-term costs but larger long-term returns (a higher-cost, higher-return [HC-HR] college). The authors find that early cost realization increases preferences for LC-LR colleges—preferences that could reduce lifetime earnings—in both simulations and experiments. Preferences for LC-LR colleges are pronounced among financially impatient students and in choice pairs of LC-LR and HC-HR colleges where the equilibrium is set at a low-discount-rate threshold. A return-on-investment strategy, future uncertainty, and debt aversion cannot explain these results. A decision aid synchronizing the psychological realization of costs and benefits reduced preferences for LC-LR colleges, illustrating that the preference is constructed and receptive to interventions.

We find that social learning, indirectly acquiring attitudes, norms, and skills by observing others, can be an effective debiasing intervention. Participants in a 3-hour laboratory experiment (E1; N = 277) who received a social learning-based training intervention exhibited a large reduction (overall dz = 1.86) from pretest to posttest in their propensity to exhibit three cognitive biases–anchoring, overgeneralization of the representativeness heuristic, and social projection–more than did controls and participants who received a purely information-based intervention. Participants in a brief online experiment (E2; N = 494) who received a social learning-based training intervention exhibited objectively improved judgment and placed significantly more weight on advice from pretest to posttest (dz ≥ .24), more than did controls, and no less than did participants who received an information-based intervention. The combination of both debiasing interventions was complementary in Experiment 2, suggesting that social learning interventions may have unique debiasing effects.

Extant theories in intertemporal choice entangle two aspects of time preference: impatience and time-inconsistency. Highly impatient people focus on the present consumption without worrying too much about the future. They spend freely and avoid exercise. An outsider may question their choices, but they should not experience conflict. In contrast, people who are time-inconsistent intend to save and exercise but fail to do so when temptation is proximate. Such individuals are conflicted; their preferences today differ from their preferences tomorrow. I diagnose how impatience and time-inconsistency interact in three leading theories by counting preference reversals in which people initially select a larger, later reward but then switch to a smaller, sooner reward. In the quasi-hyperbolic model (Laibson 1997), preference reversals increase with patience. The hyperbolic model (Mazur 1987) makes the opposite prediction, that preference reversals increase with impatience. In the constant-sensitivity model (Ebert and Prelec 2007), preference reversals peak at moderate levels of impatience. The experiment using real monetary consequences for delays up to one year supports this latter prediction.

In intertemporal choice research, choice tasks (i.e., choosing between $80 today vs. $100 in a year) are often used to elicit a discount rate. The discount rate derived from a choice task, however, is largely restricted by the granularities and ranges of the questions asked. We examined this restriction in three popular discount rate measurements using simulations and experiments, and we propose an alternative procedure (Three-option Adaptive Discount rate measurement, ToAD), which is capable of measuring a wide range of discount rates (from approximately 0.035% to 350,000% annual percentage rate) with high precision using 10 questions, in under a minute. ToAD can be easily implemented in online surveys (i.e., Qualtrics).

From failures of intelligence analysis to misguided beliefs about vaccinations, biased judgment and decision making contributes to problems in policy, business, medicine, law, education, and private life. Early attempts to reduce decision biases with training met with little success, leading scientists and policy makers to focus on debiasing by using incentives and changes in the presentation and elicitation of decisions. We report the results of two longitudinal experiments that found medium to large effects of one-shot debiasing training interventions. Participants received a single training intervention, played a computer game or watched an instructional video, which addressed biases critical to intelligence analysis (in Experiment 1:bias blind spot, confirmation bias, and fundamental attribution error; in Experiment 2: anchoring, representativeness, and social projection). Both kinds of interventions produced medium to large debiasing effects immediately (games > −31.94% and videos > −18.60%) that persisted at least 2 months later (games > −23.57% and videos > −19.20%). Games that provided personalized feedback and practice produced larger effects than did videos. Debiasing effects were domain general: bias reduction occurred across problems in different contexts, and problem formats that were taught and not taught in the interventions. The results suggest that a single training intervention can improve decision making. We suggest its use alongside improved incentives, information presentation, and nudges to reduce costly errors associated with biased judgments and decisions.

This study aimed to expand the current understanding of smoking maintenance mechanisms by examining how putative relapse risk factors relate to a single behavioral smoking choice using a novel laboratory smoking-choice task. After 12 hr of nicotine deprivation, participants were exposed to smoking cues and given the choice between smoking up to two cigarettes in a 15-min window or waiting and receiving four cigarettes after a delay of 45 min. Greater nicotine dependence, higher impulsivity, and lower distress tolerance were hypothesized to predict earlier and more intensive smoking. Out of 35 participants (n = 9 women), 26 chose to smoke with a median time to a first puff of 1.22 min (SD = 2.62 min, range = 0.03–10.62 min). Survival analyses examined latency to first puff, and results indicated that greater pretask craving and smoking more cigarettes per day were significantly related to smoking sooner in the task. Greater behavioral disinhibition predicted shorter smoking latency in the first 2 min of the task, but not at a delay of more than 2 min. Lower distress tolerance (reporting greater regulation efforts to alleviate distress) was related to more puffs smoked and greater nicotine dependence was related to more time spent smoking in the task. This novel laboratory smoking-choice paradigm may be a useful laboratory analog for the choices smokers make during cessation attempts and may help identify factors that influence smoking lapses.

The social good often depends on the altruistic behavior of specific individuals. For example, epidemiological studies of influenza indicate that elderly individuals, who face the highest mortality risk, are best protected by vaccination of young individuals, who contribute most to disease transmission. To examine the conditions under which young people would get vaccinated to protect elderly people, we conducted a game-theory experiment that mirrored real-world influenza transmission, with “young” players contributing more than “elderly” players to herd immunity. Participants could spend points to get vaccinated and reduce the risk of influenza. When players were paid according to individual point totals, more elderly than young players got vaccinated, a finding consistent with the Nash equilibrium predicting self-interested behavior. When players were paid according to group point totals, however, more young than elderly players got vaccinated—a finding consistent with the utilitarian equilibrium predicting group-optimal behavior—which resulted in higher point totals than when players were paid for their individual totals. Thus, payout structure affected whether individuals got vaccinated for self-interest or group benefit.

Changes in how a choice is presented can affect the actions of decision makers, who have a tendency to stick with the default option.1-3 For example, organ donation rates are much higher in an opt-out system (donor status is the default, explicitly opting out is required if a person does not want to donate) than in an opt-in system (non-donor status is the default, explicitly opting in is required if a person wants to be a donor). Both systems give decision makers autonomy to choose according to their personal principles, but the opt-out system provides a “nudge” toward donation. Although influenza vaccination may help prevent morbidity and mortality from seasonal or other pandemic influenza (such as 2009 influenza A [H1N1]), many people decline to receive an annual flu shot even when it is available for free at the workplace. We assessed whether modifying the default option could influence seasonal influenza vaccination.

The construal level theory proposes that a psychological distance has a systematic effect on individuals’ thought and behavior. The present study purposed to apply temporal construal to advertising and consumer behavior. Specifically, we examined the effect of construal level fit on consumer choice of products. 208 participants were presented with one of the four purchase scenarios, which were either near or far (today vs. December) and either convenience or shopping goods (portable multimedia player vs. toothpaste). Then their choices between two products with either feasible or desirable advertising messages were measured. Results showed that participants were more likely to select products of which product category, type of advertising messages, and expected purchase time were congruent. It suggests that the fitness of construal level affects consumer behaviors on product choice. Our findings have practical implications that they extended the application of the construal level theory to the consumer behavior domain.