Private but not social information validity modulates social conformity bias.

ABSTRACT: It is well established that human behaviors are susceptible to others' opinions. However, optimal decision theory mandates choices be made upon the estimated validities of different information sources and little is known about whether and how people could wean themselves off social conformity bias, especially when the social signals are uninformative. Here, we asked subjects to participate in a probabilistic urn guessing task based on their private information as well as observed choices from their partners. Specifically, we manipulated the information validity of these two sources such that only the private evidence was informative. Across trials, social conformity declined, manifested by the increased influence of the private evidence but steady effect of social information. Correspondi

SUBMITTER: Li L 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC6865577 | biostudies-literature | 2019 Jun

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature