Living near the edge: how extreme outcomes and their neighbours drive risky choice
Extreme stimuli are often more salient in perception and memory than moderate stimuli. In risky choice, when people learn the odds and outcomes from experience, the extreme outcomes (best and worst) also stand out. This additional salience leads to more risk-seeking for relative gains than for relat...
| Main Authors: | , , , , |
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| Format: | Article |
| Language: | English |
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American Psychological Association
2018
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| Online Access: | https://eprints.nottingham.ac.uk/49328/ |
| _version_ | 1848797974091530240 |
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| author | Ludvig, Elliot A. Madan, Christopher R. McMillan, Neil Xu, Yaqian Spetch, Marcia L. |
| author_facet | Ludvig, Elliot A. Madan, Christopher R. McMillan, Neil Xu, Yaqian Spetch, Marcia L. |
| author_sort | Ludvig, Elliot A. |
| building | Nottingham Research Data Repository |
| collection | Online Access |
| description | Extreme stimuli are often more salient in perception and memory than moderate stimuli. In risky choice, when people learn the odds and outcomes from experience, the extreme outcomes (best and worst) also stand out. This additional salience leads to more risk-seeking for relative gains than for relative losses—the opposite of what people do when queried in terms of explicit probabilities. Previous research has suggested that this pattern arises because the most extreme experienced outcomes are more prominent in memory. An important open question, however, is what makes these extreme outcomes more prominent? Here we assess whether extreme outcomes stand out because they fall at the edges of the experienced outcome distributions or because they are distinct from other outcomes. Across four experiments, proximity to the edge determined what was treated as extreme: Outcomes at or near the edge of the outcome distribution were both better remembered and more heavily weighted in choice. This prominence did not depend on two metrics of distinctiveness: lower frequency or distance from other outcomes. This finding adds to evidence from other domains that the values at the edges of a distribution have a special role. |
| first_indexed | 2025-11-14T20:12:24Z |
| format | Article |
| id | nottingham-49328 |
| institution | University of Nottingham Malaysia Campus |
| institution_category | Local University |
| language | English |
| last_indexed | 2025-11-14T20:12:24Z |
| publishDate | 2018 |
| publisher | American Psychological Association |
| recordtype | eprints |
| repository_type | Digital Repository |
| spelling | nottingham-493282018-04-10T15:43:48Z https://eprints.nottingham.ac.uk/49328/ Living near the edge: how extreme outcomes and their neighbours drive risky choice Ludvig, Elliot A. Madan, Christopher R. McMillan, Neil Xu, Yaqian Spetch, Marcia L. Extreme stimuli are often more salient in perception and memory than moderate stimuli. In risky choice, when people learn the odds and outcomes from experience, the extreme outcomes (best and worst) also stand out. This additional salience leads to more risk-seeking for relative gains than for relative losses—the opposite of what people do when queried in terms of explicit probabilities. Previous research has suggested that this pattern arises because the most extreme experienced outcomes are more prominent in memory. An important open question, however, is what makes these extreme outcomes more prominent? Here we assess whether extreme outcomes stand out because they fall at the edges of the experienced outcome distributions or because they are distinct from other outcomes. Across four experiments, proximity to the edge determined what was treated as extreme: Outcomes at or near the edge of the outcome distribution were both better remembered and more heavily weighted in choice. This prominence did not depend on two metrics of distinctiveness: lower frequency or distance from other outcomes. This finding adds to evidence from other domains that the values at the edges of a distribution have a special role. American Psychological Association 2018-03-22 Article PeerReviewed application/pdf en https://eprints.nottingham.ac.uk/49328/1/ExtremesMS_PsyArxiv_010518.pdf Ludvig, Elliot A., Madan, Christopher R., McMillan, Neil, Xu, Yaqian and Spetch, Marcia L. (2018) Living near the edge: how extreme outcomes and their neighbours drive risky choice. Journal of Experimental Psychology: General . ISSN 1939-2222 risky choice; decision making; memory; extreme outcomes; edge effects; end values http://dx.doi.org/10.1037/xge0000414 doi:10.1037/xge0000414 doi:10.1037/xge0000414 |
| spellingShingle | risky choice; decision making; memory; extreme outcomes; edge effects; end values Ludvig, Elliot A. Madan, Christopher R. McMillan, Neil Xu, Yaqian Spetch, Marcia L. Living near the edge: how extreme outcomes and their neighbours drive risky choice |
| title | Living near the edge: how extreme outcomes and their neighbours drive risky choice |
| title_full | Living near the edge: how extreme outcomes and their neighbours drive risky choice |
| title_fullStr | Living near the edge: how extreme outcomes and their neighbours drive risky choice |
| title_full_unstemmed | Living near the edge: how extreme outcomes and their neighbours drive risky choice |
| title_short | Living near the edge: how extreme outcomes and their neighbours drive risky choice |
| title_sort | living near the edge: how extreme outcomes and their neighbours drive risky choice |
| topic | risky choice; decision making; memory; extreme outcomes; edge effects; end values |
| url | https://eprints.nottingham.ac.uk/49328/ https://eprints.nottingham.ac.uk/49328/ https://eprints.nottingham.ac.uk/49328/ |