RUI: Collaborative Research: Assessments and Stances Regarding the Uncertainty of (Un)Desired Outcomes

对未来结果的不准确预期和预测可能会破坏决策制定和最佳规划。一种有害的不准确是乐观偏见，在这种偏见中，人们认为理想结果的可能性大于保证结果，而/或不理想结果的可能性小于保证结果。乐观偏见会导致个人行为出现问题，比如不明智的冒险和过度购买，导致工程故障导致死亡等人类悲剧，以及股市泡沫等具有社会意义的现象。动机目标通常被认为是乐观偏见的基础，但对于不同的目标何时影响乐观情绪，包括有可能降低乐观情绪和提高准确性的目标，人们的理解并不充分。事实上，主流理论假设对结果的偏好和对结果的期望是独立的，这与一些实证研究结果不一致。拟议的研究解决了这一差异。这项研究是由一个新颖的目标偏见期望框架构成的，它假设了环境特征，这些特征塑造了一个人在形成期望时可以采取的两种方向之间的平衡。取向的平衡最终决定了目标是否以及如何塑造期望。该框架还有助于制定消除偏见或减少过度乐观的步骤，并提高专业预报员和公众的准确性。消除过度乐观的偏见可以改善预测，并最终在许多情况下（例如，金融、卫生、安全）更好地规划、准备和结果。将进行三条实验线。一条线将检查的范围，并负责的过程，在如何衡量期望是由结果的可取性或偏好影响的关键差异。过去的研究结果给出了结果可取性在多大程度上具有偏倚影响的不同指标，但这些差异可能与研究和日常环境中通常征求期望的两种方式之间的区别一致。第二行将讨论可用信息的类型如何影响可取性偏差。一种令人惊讶的可能性是，随着信息变得更加清晰，人们的取向和目标会发生变化，从而产生更多而不是更少的偏见。第三条线将测试一种针对过度乐观的新型去偏见干预措施。研究的参与者将包括体育迷、洪泛区的房主和病人。已知有三个群体表现出过度乐观。所有建议的工作都将为目标偏差期望框架的有效性提供信息。这项资助将涉及与研究生和本科生的合作研究，因此将在他们的研究训练/教育中发挥重要作用。该奖项反映了美国国家科学基金会的法定使命，并通过使用基金会的知识价值和更广泛的影响审查标准进行评估，被认为值得支持。

Inaccuracies in expectations and predictions about future outcomes can ruin decision making and optimal planning. One pernicious type of inaccuracy is an optimism bias, in which preferred outcomes are viewed as more likely than warranted and/or unpreferred outcomes are viewed as less likely than warranted. Optimism biases lead to problematic individual behaviors like unwise risk taking and over-purchasing, human tragedies like deaths from engineering failures and societally important phenomena like stock market bubbles. Motivational goals are often assumed to underlie optimism biases but there is an inadequate understanding of when different goals impact optimism, including goals that have the potential to reduce optimism and promote accuracy. In fact, major theories assume that preferences for outcomes and expectations about the outcomes are independent, which is inconsistent with some empirical findings. The proposed research addresses this discrepancy. The research is structured by a novel Goal-Biased Expectations Framework, which posits contextual features that shape the balance between two orientations that a person can take toward forming expectations. The balance of orientations ultimately determines whether and how goals shape expectations. The framework is also useful for developing steps to debias or reduce overoptimism and promote accuracy among professional forecasters and the public. Debiasing overoptimism can yield improved predictions and ultimately better planning, preparation, and outcomes across many contexts (e.g., financial, health, security). Three lines of experiments will be conducted. One line will examine the scope of, and processes responsible for, a crucial difference in how measures of expectations are affected by outcome desirability or preference. Past research findings have returned quite different indicators of the extent to which outcome desirability has a biasing influence, but these differences might align with a distinction between two ways in which expectations are commonly solicited in studies and in everyday contexts. A second line will address how types of available information influence the desirability bias. One surprising possibility is that as information becomes more clear, people's orientation and goals shift in a manner that produces more bias rather than less. A third line will test a novel debiasing intervention for overoptimism. Participants in the studies will include sports fans, owners of homes in floodplains, and patients?three groups known to exhibit overoptimism. All of the proposed work will inform the validity of the Goal-Biased Expectations framework. The studies on this grant will involve collaboration with graduate and undergraduate students, and therefore will play important roles in their research training/education.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.