How mood-related physiological states bias economic decisions.

ABSTRACT: When making decisions, humans are susceptible to all sorts of biases, relative to rational norms. An important factor is incidental changes in affective states, such as variations in mood between happiness and sadness. We previously developed a computational model, in which mood affects choice by forming a predisposition to face costs and seek more rewards. Here, we generalized this theory to account for how specific inductions of happiness and sadness affect different types of economic decisions involving a tradeoff between costs (risk, delay, effort) and benefits (financial rewards). Across exploratory and confirmatory studies (N = 94), we observed a consistent bias exerted by transitory mood states, whether they were assessed through self-reports (rated happiness minus sadness) or infer

SUBMITTER: Heerema R 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC11969019 | biostudies-literature | 2025 Apr

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature