Contextualized Decision Making

目前的建议是由社会心理学家和认知心理学家共同致力于研究人类的决策。它的目的是弥合决策研究与社会和认知心理学研究之间经常观察到的差距。本研究从决策是一个建构性的过程，因此具有高度的语境依赖性这一一般概念出发，提出了两个核心主题：第一，本研究基于过程导向的视角，从而将社会认知和认知心理学的显性过程导向视角与决策研究的核心概念、理论、方法和研究问题联系起来。有一个特别的重点是(A)在决策情况的输入和最终的决定之间进行调解的过程，(B)调节这一过程的变量，以及(C)对假设的因果过程链的实验测试。这样的做法对双方都有利。一方面，个体决策的研究可以从社会和认知心理学的过程取向中获得极大的好处，因为这些方法可以解释为什么决策在很大程度上依赖于做出决策的背景。同样，行为决策研究可以促进社会心理学和认知心理学的理论和经验进步。第二，本提案旨在全面涵盖决策的背景方面。我们不仅将决策语境概念化为各种信息、决策选择或社会语境，还将其概念化为决策者的内在情感、动机和认知状态。因此，根据不同的侧重点，这些项目将研究(A)情感、(B)动机和(C)认知机制在人类决策中的作用。此外，这些项目还将涵盖内部进程与(D)社会和(E)信息环境(信息传播)的相互作用。除了单个项目中对这些决定因素的单一报道外，一个研究单位(Forschergruppe)的联合倡议将大力促进和支持对这些决定因素如何相互作用的调查，目的是实现包括各种因素在内的综合情况。

The present proposal is a joint undertaking by social and cognitive psychologists to investigate human decision making. It aims at bridging the frequently observed gap between research in decision making and research in social and cognitive psychology. Starting from the general notion that decision making is a constructive process and therefore heavily context-dependent, the present proposal has two core themes: First, the proposed research is based on a process-oriented perspective; thus, we will link social cognition and cognitive psychology’s explicit process-oriented perspective with the core concepts, theories, methods, and research questions of decision making research. There is a particular focus (a) on the processes that mediate between the input of a decision situation and the resulting decision, (b) on variables that moderate this processes, and (c) on experimental tests of the hypothesized causal process chains. Such an approach is beneficial for both sides. On the one hand, research in individual decision making could strongly benefit from social and cognitive psychology’s process-orientation, as these approaches may offer explanations why decisions depend so heavily on the context in which they are made. Equally, behavioral decision-making research could stimulate theoretical and empirical progress in social and cognitive psychology. Second, the present proposal aims at a comprehensive coverage of the contextual aspects of decision making. We conceptualize the decision context not only as various kinds of information, the decision alternatives, or the social context, but also as the internal affective, motivational, and cognitive state of the decision maker. Thus, with different foci, the projects will investigate the role of (a) affective, (b) motivational, and (c) cognitive mechanisms involved in human decision making. Moreover, the projects will also cover the interplay of internal processes with (d) the social and (e) the informational environment (distribution of information). Going beyond singular coverage of these determinants in the individual projects, the joint initiative of a Research Unit (Forschergruppe) will strongly foster and support an investigation of how these determinants interact with each other, with the goal of achieving an integrated picture that includes the various elements.