Year: 2010
Type: article
Abstract: The present study explored age differences in emotionally difficult trade-off decisions and the underlying mechanism of the age-related effects.Forty younger adults and 40 older adults finished two decision tasks (i.e., purchasing a car vs. choosing a physician).They were randomly assigned to either the high trade-off difficulty condition or the low trade-off difficulty condition for both decision tasks.MouselabWEB software was used to trace participants' decision making process.Results showed that older adults were more likely to use attribute-based processing strategies compared with younger adults in the high trade-off difficulty condition for both tasks.On the other hand, younger adults were more likely to use alternative-based processing strategies compared with older adults in the high trade-off difficulty condition.In the car decision task, the retrospective negative emotion instead of cognitive ability mediated the age-related effects in processing strategies in the high trade-off difficulty condition.iii I dedicate this dissertation to my parents who always have faith in me.
Author: Xiaodong Ma
Institution: Bowling Green State University
Language: English
Subfield: General Decision Sciences
Field: Decision Sciences
Domain: Social Sciences
Open Access status: green
OpenAlex ID: W173241109