The effect of incentives on intertemporal choice: Choice, confidence, and eye movements

Frontiers in Psychology

article

Xing-Lan Yang¹  Si-Tan Chen¹  Hong-Zhi Liu¹ 

[1] Department of Social Psychology, Zhou Enlai School of Government, Nankai University;Laboratory of Behavioral Economics and Policy Simulation, Nankai University

关键词: incentive;    Intertemporal choice;    decision confidence;    Eye-tracking;    loss;   

DOI  :  10.3389/fpsyg.2022.989511

学科分类：社会科学、人文和艺术（综合）

来源: Frontiers

【 摘 要 】

Despite various studies examining intertemporal choice with hypothetical rewards due to problematic real reward delivery, there remains no substantial evidence on the effect of the incentives on the decision confidence and cognitive process in intertemporal choice and no comprehensive exploration on the loss domain. Hence, this study conducts an eye-tracking experiment to examine the effect of incentive approach and measure participants’ decision confidence using a between-subject design in both gain and loss domains. Results replicated previous findings which show incentives do not affect intertemporal choice in the gain domain. In contrast, in the loss domain, participants in the incentivized group were more likely to choose the larger-later options than those in the non-incentivized group. Furthermore, the decision confidence and the mean fixation duration differed between the incentivized and non-incentivized groups in both gain and loss domains. These findings allow for a better understanding of the effect of incentives on intertemporal choice and provide valuable information for the design of incentives in future intertemporal experiments.

【 授权许可】

CC BY