Effortful Processing Reduces the Attraction Effect in Multi-Alternative Decision Making: An Electrophysiological Study Using a Task-Irrelevant Probe Technique

The attraction effect in multi-alternative decision making reflects the context-dependent violation of axioms that are considered fundamental to rational choice. This effect is believed to depend on relatively effortless and intuitive processing (System 1) rather than on effortful and elaborative processing (System 2). To investigate the relationship between cognitive resources and the attraction effect in detail, we used a task-irrelevant probe technique, wherein task-irrelevant auditory probes were presented while participants viewed each alternative in a decision-making task, and measured the electroencephalographic responses to the probes. Thirty participants solved 48 hypothetical purchase problems with three alternatives that differed in terms of two attributes. We found that, in the second epoch of the experimental trials (possibly corresponding to the evaluation and comparison stage), the mean N1 amplitudes of the event-related potentials elicited by the auditory probes were significantly smaller when participants chose the competitor (i.e., trials in which no attraction effect occurred) than when participants chose the target (i.e., trials in which an attraction effect may have occurred). This result suggests that the allocation of more cognitive resources to the alternatives disrupts the attraction effect. This finding supports the assumption that intuitive comparisons among alternatives executed by System 1 are critical for the occurrence of the attraction effect

Itsuki Chiba's Quick Files

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A time-series eye-fixation analysis of the similarity-compromise effect inmulti-alternative choice

In decision-making tasks with two attributes and three alternatives, the similarity effect implies that, if the totalexpected utility is equal between two opposite alternatives (i.e., the target and competitor), the probability of the target beingchosen decreases with the addition of the decoy similar to the target. This study demonstrated the similarity-compromiseeffect, wherein the probability of the target being chosen increased with the addition of the decoy, under the same conditionsas the similarity effect, by setting all attribute values of three alternatives to broken numbers rather than rounded numbers.To determine the mechanism underlying this effect, we examined information acquisition patterns using eye-movement datacollected from 37 undergraduates who made 10 hypothetical purchase tasks with two attributes and three alternatives. Time-series analysis of fixation time for the three alternatives revealed dynamic temporal features distinct from those of attractionand compromise effects observed in our previous research