An Allais paradox without mental time travel

ABSTRACT The capacity to anticipate future experiences of regret has been hypothesized to explain otherwise irrational aspects of human decision‐making, including the certainty effect (Kahneman and Tversky (1979) Econometrica 47:263–291) and the common ratio effect (Allais (1953) Econometrica 21:503...

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Bibliographic Details
Published in:Hippocampus 2014-11, Vol.24 (11), p.1375-1380
Main Authors: Craver, Carl F., Cova, Florian, Green, Leonard, Myerson, Joel, Rosenbaum, R. Shayna, Kwan, Donna, Bourgeois-Gironde, Sacha
Format: Article
Language:English
Subjects:
Aged
Amnesia - physiopathology
Choice Behavior - physiology
decision-making
emotions
Emotions - physiology
episodic memory
Female
Hippocampus - physiopathology
Humans
Imagination - physiology
Male
Middle Aged
Neuropsychological Tests
reasoning
risk taking
Temporal Lobe - physiopathology
Thinking - physiology
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Summary:ABSTRACT The capacity to anticipate future experiences of regret has been hypothesized to explain otherwise irrational aspects of human decision‐making, including the certainty effect (Kahneman and Tversky (1979) Econometrica 47:263–291) and the common ratio effect (Allais (1953) Econometrica 21:503–546). The anticipated regret hypothesis predicts that individuals incapable of episodically imagining their personal futures, as has been reported for people with extensive damage to medial temporal lobe structures and resulting deficits in episodic thought, should be immune to these effects. We report that K.C., who has extensive bilateral damage to his hippocampus and adjacent medial temporal lobe structures and nearly complete deficits in his ability to episodically imagine his personal future, nonetheless displays both the certainty and the common ratio effects. These results suggest that the episodic anticipation of future regret does not explain the general human tendency to display the certainty and common ratio effects. © 2014 Wiley Periodicals, Inc.
ISSN:1050-9631
1098-1063
DOI:10.1002/hipo.22318