Everyday Decision Making

为期1年的研究目的是检验战略信息搜索的年龄和经验差异；检查决策质量的各种措施的效用；并探讨任务绩效、决策质量和智力心理测量三者之间的关系。因此，本研究有可能显著地推进当前关于决策中高阶认知加工的方法和经验知识基础。为了实现这些目标，该研究建议使用150名50岁以上的成年人的数据来检查认知能力、任务表现和决策质量的指标，其中一半将是70岁以上。考虑到70岁以上和70岁以下人群在认知能力、策略和动机方面的差异，这种对比是有充分根据的。为了使任务材料的相关性最大化，从搬迁和消费者购买领域中提取决策任务的现实任务材料。个人会为自己和假想的他人做决定。假设任务绩效指标直接预测决策质量，而认知能力指标间接影响决策质量。路径分析模型将用于检验各种措施和结构之间的多元关系。

The goals of the 1-year study are to examine age and experience differences in strategic information search; examine the utility of various measures of decision quality; and explore the relationships among measures of task performance, decision quality and psychometric measures of intelligence. Thus, the study has the potential to significantly advance the current methodology and empirical knowledge base concerning higher-order cognitive processing in decision making. To accomplish these goals, the study proposes to examine measures of cognitive ability, task performance, and decision quality using data from 150 adults over age 50, stratified such that half will be age 70+. Such a contrast is well-founded given the observed differences in cognitive capacity, strategies, and motivations between those over and under age 70. In order to maximize the relevance of the task materials, realistic task materials for a decision-making task are drawn from the domains of relocation and consumer purchases. Individuals will make decisions for themselves and for hypothetical others. It is hypothesized that Task Performance measures will directly predict Decision Quality, whereas measures of Cognitive Ability will indirectly impact Decision Quality. A path analytic model will be used to test the multivariate relations among the various measures and constructs.