Autonomy and Behavioral Risk Preferences

许多情况下需要面对风险情况：例如，关于退休的个人选择，对高风险投资组合的投资，关于销售客户需求不确定的新产品的商业决策，或者不清楚国际后果的外交政策战略。这个项目测试了这样一种观点，即当决策者意识到他们可以控制他们所经历的风险水平时，他们更容易接受风险。自主性的作用可能解释了为什么决策者选择一个小的可能性大的结果，而不是一个小的确定的替代方案，即使小的确定的结果比作为完成一项努力任务的奖励的不确定的数额更具激励作用。研究结果对理解决策者何时最愿意承担风险以及如何最好地激励绩效任务具有重要意义。风险下的决策在日常生活中随处可见。在一些有风险的情况下，决策者对他们所经历的风险水平有自主权，而在另一些情况下，决策者对环境中存在的指定风险做出反应。这项研究项目检验了这样一种假设，即自主性提高了风险容忍度，使得决策者在选择一个选项时会比在应对分配的风险时表现出更多的寻求风险的偏好。一组研究测试了这样一种预测，即自主性，甚至只是对控制的感知，会提高风险容忍度。也就是说，如果决策者认为他们可以控制他们所经历的风险水平，那么他们预计会更倾向于高风险的替代方案，即使拥有和没有自主权的决策者之间的客观风险水平保持不变。第二组研究将自主性的影响应用于为什么决策者倾向于选择低概率彩票而不是匹配的特定结果，而类似的彩票相对于某些激励并不能作为努力任务的有效激励。研究人员将选择任务中显示的风险偏好与具有实际激励的努力任务中显示的风险偏好进行了比较，他们试图分离出导致风险偏好差异的任务特征，并测试自主性的差异是否可以解释为什么决策者会选择高风险的选项，而不是为他们工作。十项实验室实验和两项实地研究验证了预测。这一奖项反映了NSF的法定使命，并通过使用基金会的智力优势和更广泛的影响审查标准进行评估，被认为值得支持。

Many situations require confronting risky situations: for example, personal choices about retirement, investment in risky portfolios, business decisions about selling new products with uncertain customer demand, or foreign policy strategies with unclear international consequences. This project tests the idea that decision makers are more accepting of risk when they perceive that they have control over the level of risk they experience. The role of autonomy may explain why decision makers choose a small likelihood of a large outcome over a small certain alternative even though the small certain outcome is more motivating than the uncertain amount as a reward for performing an effortful task. The research findings have implications for understanding when decision makers are most willing to take on risk and for how best to incentivize performance tasks.Decisions under risk are ubiquitous in everyday life. In some risky situations decision makers have autonomy over the risk level they experience while in others decision makers respond to an assigned risk present in the environment. This research project tests the hypothesis that autonomy increases risk tolerance such that decision makers will exhibit more risk-seeking preferences when they can choose an option than when they respond to an assigned risk. One set of studies tests the prediction that autonomy, or even just the perception of control, increases risk tolerance. That is, decision makers are predicted to have a stronger preference for risky alternatives if they perceive that they have control over the risk level they experience, even when the objective risk level is held constant between decision makers who do and do not have autonomy. A second set of studies applies the effects of autonomy to why decision makers tend to choose low probability lotteries over matched certain outcomes whereas similar lotteries do not serve as effective incentives for effort tasks relative to certain incentives. The researchers compare risk preferences revealed in choice tasks to those revealed in effort tasks with real incentives, they seek to isolate the task features responsible for the difference in risk preference, and they test whether differences in perceived autonomy can explain why decision makers will choose risky options but not work for them. Ten laboratory experiments and two field studies test the predictions.This award reflects NSF's statutory mission and has been deemed worthy of support through evaluation using the Foundation's intellectual merit and broader impacts review criteria.