No abstract

Pervasive noise undermines many cognitive processes. Across two studies, we examined how noise influences experience-based decision-making and whether the nature of the information provided moderates this influence. Study 1 used the repeated choice paradigm and found that noise can significantly reduce people’s performance in experience-based decision-making by increasing the likelihood of choosing the option with the lower expected value. This negative influence can be attenuated when experience-congruent suggestions are provided, but significantly worsened when experience-incongruent suggestions are provided. Study 2 investigated how noise influences decision-making performance in two experience-incongruent conditions differing in error salience. By replicating noise’s general negative effect, we found that the noise effect could be attenuated when incongruent suggestions were obvious. We suggest that noise can undermine the information updating and integration process, which is necessary for experience-based decision-making. We also discuss the principles for designing better information aids based on these findings.

Mathematical ability has always been considered an important influencing factor in description‐based risky choices. Experience‐based risky choices, which occur frequently in daily life, are very different from description‐based risky choices. The association between experience‐based risky choice and mathematical ability remains unknown. This study adopts the feedback paradigm for experience‐based risky choice to explore the association between multiple mathematical abilities and experience‐based risky choice. The results show that, in experience‐based risky choice, mathematical ability did not influence the decision to pursue higher expected value, but it did influence preference for risky. Thus, our study contributes to a more comprehensive view of mathematical ability and risky choice.