Frequent winners explain apparent skewness preferences in experience-based decisions

• 成果类型: Article
• 署名作者: Olschewski, Sebastian; Spektor, Mikhail S.; Le Mens, Gael
• 署名单位: University of Basel; University of Warwick; University of Warwick; Pompeu Fabra University
• 刊物名称: PROCEEDINGS OF THE NATIONAL ACADEMY OF SCIENCES OF THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA
• ISSN/ISSBN: 0027-9134
• DOI: 10.1073/pnas.2317751121
• 发表日期: 2024-03-19
• 关键词: order risk attitudes; lotteries; CHOICE; maximization; probability; sensitivity; variance; events; biases; stocks

摘要

Do people's attitudes toward the (a)symmetry of an outcome distribution affect their choices? Financial investors seek return distributions with frequent small returns but few large ones, consistent with leading models of choice in economics and finance that assume right -skewed preferences. In contrast, many experiments in which decision -makers learn about choice options through experience find the opposite choice tendency, in favor of left -skewed options. To reconcile these seemingly contradicting findings, the present work investigates the effect of skewness on choices in experiencebased decisions. Across seven studies, we show that apparent preferences for left -skewed outcome distributions are a consequence of those distributions having a higher value in most direct outcome comparisons, a frequent -winner effect. By manipulating which option is the frequent winner, we show that choice tendencies for frequent winners can be obtained even with identical outcome distributions. Moreover, systematic choice tendencies in favor of rightor left -skewed options can be obtained by manipulating which option is experienced as the frequent winner. We also find evidence for an intrinsic preference for right -skewed outcome distributions. The frequent -winner phenomenon is robust to variations in outcome distributions and experimental paradigms. These findings are confirmed by computational analyses in which a reinforcement -learning model capturing frequent winning and intrinsic skewness preferences provides the best account of the data. Our work reconciles conflicting findings of aggregated behavior in financial markets and experiments and highlights the need for theories of decision -making sensitive to joint outcome distributions of the available options.