Disentangling motivational and experiential aspects of “utility” – A neuroeconomics perspective

Abstract

Standard-Nutzungsbedingungen:Die Dokumente auf EconStor dürfen zu eigenen wissenschaftlichen Zwecken und zum Privatgebrauch gespeichert und kopiert werden.Sie dürfen die Dokumente nicht für öffentliche oder kommerzielle Zwecke vervielfältigen, öffentlich ausstellen, öffentlich zugänglich machen, vertreiben oder anderweitig nutzen.Sofern die Verfasser die Dokumente unter Open-Content-Lizenzen (insbesondere CC-Lizenzen) zur Verfügung gestellt haben sollten, gelten abweichend von diesen Nutzungsbedingungen die in der dort genannten Lizenz gewährten Nutzungsrechte. Terms of use: Documents in EconStor may AbstractAlthough decision makers are often reported to have difficulties in making comparisons between multi-dimensional decision outcomes, economic theory assumes a uni-dimensional utility measure. This paper reviews evidence from behavioral and brain sciences to assess whether, and for what reasons, this assumption may be warranted. It is claimed that the decision makers' difficulties can be explained once the motivational aspects of utility ("wanting") are disentangled from the experiential ones ("liking") and the features of the different psychological processes involved are recognized.

Autonomy-Enhancing Paternalism

“…Without the ability to make au-tonomous decisions, nudges can put individuals in danger of "learn"ing to be helpless (Binder, 2013) losing their ability to pursue their own happiness (Schubert, 2012). Hence, these aspects have to be considered when engaging in cost-benefit analyses of nudges.…”

“…Binder, 2013). Moreover, these types of tests, which, in essence, could be seen as stated (meta-)preferences are influenced by "faulty affective forecasting" and related mispredictions of future well-being, where individuals focus on salient aspects of a decision or neglect hedonic adaptation when predicting their future well-being and forming preferences based on this (Wilson and Gilbert, 2005;Gilbert, 2007).…”

“…(Binder, 2010, Witt andBinder, 2013). An additional problem in the libertarian paternalistic framework is that it is unclear whether "as judged by themselves" refers to the individuals' ex ante predictions about what makes them better off, or to what actually makes them better off ex post.…”

“…The debate sparked by libertarian paternalism provides a useful stimulus to explore the normative and political consequences of behavioral economics. Correspondingly, libertarian paternalism has found a number of prominent defenders (e.g., Camerer, 2006;Trout, 2005;Loewenstein and Haisley, 2008;Amir and Lobel, 2008;Desai, 2011;Sunstein, 2012) and an equal if not greater number of critics (Sugden, 2008;Rizzo and Whitman, 2009a,b;Binder, 2013).…”

“…These problems are (1) the difficulty for the choice architect to detect what is in the best interest of an individual, (2) the focus on "freedom of choice" at the expense of a focus on "autonomy" in the sense of critical reflection of decisions, 1 and (3) the neglect of the dynamic effects of libertarian paternalistic policy interventions, which are usually analyzed in a timeless one-shot perspective (see Binder, 2013, on these points). In order to overcome these three shortcomings, we present a form of soft paternalism, which we call "autonomy-enhancing paternalism" (AEP), which adopts attractive insights of libertarian paternalism, but avoids its most serious shortcomings.…”