A note on optimal experimentation under risk aversion

Keller, Godfrey; Novák, Vladimír; Willems, Tim

doi:10.1016/j.jet.2018.11.006

Cited by 10 publications

(8 citation statements)

References 24 publications

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“…Additionally, while we did not find an effect of body image concerns or preoccupations on our findings, future studies could use more detailed measures for this multifaceted dimension. Also, it went beyond the scope of the current study to combine the two modeling approaches that we applied separately to our B-BART results, and we did not examine whether the observed level of risk taking is "rational" or "optimal" (see discussions by Benjamin & Robbins, 2007;Keller et al, 2019), nor whether using food stimuli, or manipulating hunger level might influence decision making. However, our study paves the way for future research to consider these issues in JENKINSON ET AL. unison rather than in isolation.…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Body appearance values modulate risk aversion in eating restriction.

Jenkinson,

Koukoutsakis,

Panagiotopoulou

et al. 2023

Journal of Experimental Psychology: General

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The understanding of eating disorders is hindered by the lack of integration between existing psychosocial and neurobiological approaches. We address this problem by developing a novel transdiagnostic and computational approach to eating restriction decisions. We first validated a novel paradigm which extends an established monetary risk task to involve body stimuli with psychosocial values. We used advanced behavioral data analysis of a large (total N = 539) sample of women from across the eating restraint spectrum, including those with anorexia nervosa (AN; n = 31), recovered from AN (n = 23), and subclinical women with varying levels of eating restraint (n = 485), obtained from an online experiment, public event, and laboratory-based study. We found that social and motivational values regarding body appearance have a significant effect on value-based, decision making in eating restriction. Subsequently, validated descriptive and predictive advanced computational modeling indicated that these behaviors are driven by an aversion to risk rather than loss, with desirable body outcomes being associated with less risk aversion, and undesirable body outcomes linked to greater risk aversion. These findings indicate that cognitive and social factors influence eating decisions by distinct mechanisms. Public Significance StatementThis study demonstrates how socially derived values about the body's ideal appearance can influence risk taking in women who restrict their eating. We cast new light on eating decisions and why some women may choose to take significant health risks in the pursuit of thinness.

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Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Body appearance values modulate risk aversion in eating restriction.

Jenkinson,

Koukoutsakis,

Panagiotopoulou

et al. 2023

Journal of Experimental Psychology: General

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“…However, according to recent theoretical developments a one way to overcome this apparent trap is to focus on farmer experimentation as the foundation of the decision-making process. Keller et al (2019) show that even the most risk-averse individuals might make risky decisions when risky situations produce information that can be used to reduce risk in the future. We advocate that sampling plans for decision-making in pest management should offer a focus on experimentation, in such a way that farmers are provided with tools to make calculated bets (experiments) on the establishment of action thresholds.…”

Section: Resultsmentioning

confidence: 99%

Revisiting pest sampling plans in light of economic uncertainty and risk aversion.

et al. 2020

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Decision-making for pest management in agriculture is often assisted by sampling plans that guide users in determining the need for an intervention. Even though Tuta absoluta is easily recognizable by most tomato growers and that several sampling plans have been developed, adoption of decision-making systems for this pest is still incipient. Two potential obstacles for adoption are market uncertainty and farmer's risk aversion. Both obstacles could be tackled by adopting sampling plans that allow farmers to plan interventions according to rough estimations of economic thresholds and the intuition and experience gained by farmers. In this study, we evaluated four sampling plans using computer simulations and field trials. We compared the efficiency and the ability of each plan to both estimate the actual mean number of larvae per plant and to classify pest populations according to a predefined economic threshold. We also analyzed the time spent, and plants examined by human subjects applying each plan on a tomato crop with a T. absoluta infestation slightly over a predefined economic threshold. We show that sampling plans that deliver the most precise classifications, are poorest in delivering pest density estimations and vice versa. Our findings are consistent for both human subjects and computer simulations. However, the average number of samples required by sampling plans does not reflect the time spent by humans sampling real plants. Our results show that sampling plans based on counts, as opposed to those based on binary data, can efficiently provide reliable information on a current level of T. absoluta infestation relative to an estimated decision threshold. We suggest that sampling plans that promote the creation of farmer's memory, such as those based on counts, may be more suitable to both reduce risk aversion and increase adaptability to market uncertainty.

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“…Risk aversion has been incorporated in theoretical work on the single-agent exponential bandit model. Keller et al (2019) show that the optimal cutoff belief under non-linear utility is uðsÞ λuðhÞ þ λ r ðλuðhÞ − uðsÞÞ : However, risk aversion seems unlikely as the main explanation for under-experimentation. For example, we have shown in Section 4.2 that High Prior Session subjects stop at different good-state probabilities in the High Prior and Baseline treatments.…”

Section: Discussion Of Behavioral Explanationsmentioning

confidence: 96%

Exploration versus exploitation: A laboratory test of the single‐agent exponential bandit model

Hudja

Woods

2023

Economic Inquiry

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This paper analyzes how individuals resolve an exploration versus exploitation trade‐off in a laboratory experiment. The experiment implements the single‐agent exponential bandit model. We analyze how subjects respond to changes in the prior belief, safe action, and discount factor. We find that subjects respond in the predicted direction to these changes. However, we find that subjects under‐respond to the prior belief, under‐respond to the safe action, and typically explore less than predicted. Our results suggest that neither risk aversion nor the random termination probability are driving under‐experimentation. Our results are consistent with subjects having incorrect beliefs about exploration.

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A note on optimal experimentation under risk aversion

Cited by 10 publications

References 24 publications

Body appearance values modulate risk aversion in eating restriction.

Body appearance values modulate risk aversion in eating restriction.

Revisiting pest sampling plans in light of economic uncertainty and risk aversion.

Exploration versus exploitation: A laboratory test of the single‐agent exponential bandit model

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