Exploring and Exploiting the Understanding/Acceptance Assumption

关于行为决策的实验经常将人们的行为(描述性事实)与他们应该如何行为(理性的或规范的模型)进行比较。在过去的几十年里，它们之间存在着许多不同之处。然而，理性行为和实际行为之间的差异是否表明行为或理性模型(或其应用)存在问题，有时会引发激烈辩论。了解所讨论的行为是否真的是理性的是重要的，这既是因为了解我们应该如何推理或做出决策对于改进判断和决策具有实际意义，也是因为它影响了该领域许多人的研究策略。那么，人们怎么知道什么是理性的呢？理性是由分析和推理决定的；它依赖于论点。因为一些论点比其他论点更好，而且可以引入新的论点，所以被认为合理的东西可能会改变。尽管如此，在什么是理性的问题上，专家们可以--而且经常这样做--意见不一。这项拟议的研究调查了各种各样的非专家，他们是否认为有争议的错误和偏见实际上就是错误，以及他们是否受到支持和/或反对传统解释的论点的影响。这项研究不仅对关于理性行为的辩论做出了重要贡献，而且还告诉了我们很多关于人们对理性的直觉，这本身就是有价值的。这些研究向参与者呈现了据称是对理性模型的描述性违反，以看看他们是否相信有问题的行为确实是错误的。例如，人们认为对框架实验中使用的典型框架做出不同的反应是错误的吗？此外，研究议程纳入了“理解/接受”原则--即，假设理解越深，接受规范性原则的意愿就越大--向参与者提供相互竞争的规范性说明，看看这是否会影响他们是否认为所讨论的行为是错误的。例如，理解描述不变性的原则是否会导致参与者认为框架效应是错误的？这些研究考察了人们对框架效应、联合分离反转、缺省效应和不及物等行为现象的直觉和对争论的反应。在每个案例中，目标都是检验接受传统的理性概念化或相互竞争的会计的令人信服的论点。该奖项反映了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。

Experiments on behavioral decision making often compare how people behave (descriptive facts) with how they ought to behave (rational, or normative, models). Many differences have been documented over the past several decades between them. However, whether differences between rational and actual behavior signal a problem with behavior or with the rational model (or its application) is sometimes hotly debated. And knowing whether the behavior in question is indeed (ir)rational is important, both because understanding how we ought to reason or make decisions has practical implications for improving judgments and decisions, and because it influences the research strategy of much of the field. How, then, does one know what is rational? Rationality is determined by analysis and reasoning; it rests on arguments. Because some arguments are better than others, and because new arguments can be introduced, what is deemed rational can change. Nonetheless, experts can -- and often do -- disagree on what is rational. The proposed research probes a wide variety of non-experts about whether they believe that controversial errors and biases are in fact mistakes, and whether they are swayed by arguments for and/or against traditional interpretations. The research does not only contribute in important ways to the debate regarding rational behavior, but also tell us a great deal about people’s intuitions about rationality, which is itself intrinsically valuable.The studies present participants with purportedly descriptive violations of rational models to see whether they believe that the behaviors in question are indeed mistakes. For example, do people consider it a mistake to respond differently to the typical frames used in framing experiments? In addition, the research agenda incorporates the “understanding/acceptance” principle -- namely, the assumption that the deeper the understanding, the greater the willingness to accept a normative principle -- by presenting participants with competing normative accounts and seeing if that influences whether they believe that the behavior in question is a mistake. For example, does understanding the principle of description invariance lead participants to accept framing effects as mistakes? The studies examine people’s intuitions about, and responses to arguments about, behavioral phenomena such as framing effects, joint-separate reversals, default effects, and intransitivity. In each case, the goal is to examine the compelling arguments for accepting the traditional conceptualization of rationality or the competing accounts.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.