Structural models of decision heuristics under uncertainty

1995 Fiscal Year Final Research Report Summary

• Project/Area Number: 06610056
• Research Category: Grant-in-Aid for General Scientific Research (C)
• Allocation Type: Single-year Grants
• Research Field: 実験系心理学
• Research Institution: Hokkaido University
• Principal Investigator: TAKIGAWA Tetsuo Hokkaido Univ., Faculty of Letters Professor, 文学部, 教授 (30098503)
• Project Period (FY): 1994 – 1995
• Keywords: N-Person games / Choice axioms / Dilemmas / Conflict / Heuristics

Research Abstract

The present study researched the structural relationship between the decision heuristics and the choice axioms in the N-person game situations. The experimental games used in this study are 2 sets of 39 games with linear payoffs and step-wise payoffs in the 3-person and 11-person frameworks. The results were analyzed from the following aspects : the subjects'choice responses, the difficulties of choosing, and the choice reasons described by 132 subjects. The analysis showed that the game situations should be divided into two categories of exclusiveness dilemmas and equivalence dilemmas. Some games such as CABA and CBCA,which are different from the social dilemma game (DBCA) in some aspects, were found to have highly interesting features. They are consisted of not only the element of the exclusiveness dilemma but slso the element of the equivalence dilemma. The subjects evaluated those games very difficult to decide which to choose than the social dilemma game. We have further constructed a new index to count the degree of dilemma structure. This index was found very explanatory of the subjects'evaluation of the difficulties of the decisions in game situations.