Decision deadlines and uncertainty monitoring: the effect of time constraints on uncertainty and perceptual responses.

ABSTRACT: The behavioral uncertainty response has grounded the study of animal metacognition and influenced the study of human psychophysics. However, the interpretation of this response is debated--especially whether it is a behavioral index of metacognition. The authors advanced this interpretation using the dissociative technique of response deadlines. Uncertainty responding, if it is higher level or metacognitive, should depend on a slower, more controlled decisional process and be more vulnerable to time constraints. Humans performed sparse-uncertain-dense or sparse-middle-dense discriminations in which, respectively, they could decline difficult trials or positively identify middle stimuli. Uncertainty responses were sharply and selectively reduced under a decision deadline, as compared to pri

SUBMITTER: Zakrzewski AC 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC3966987 | biostudies-literature | 2014 Jun

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature