Online Archive of University of Virginia Scholarship
Development of Novel Generative Models of Sequentially Dependent Decision Making in Risk-Ambiguous Environments260 views
Author
Fenton, Adam, Psychology - Graduate School of Arts and Sciences, University of Virginia0000-0002-3479-7914
Advisors
Sederberg, Per, AS-Psychology (PSYC), University of Virginia
Abstract
In this dissertation, I present multiple generative cognitive models of sequentially dependent decision-making in risk-ambiguous environments. Cognitive models provide a means by which we can test theorized latent mechanisms that give rise to observed behavior. Utilizing variants of the Balloon Analogue Risk Task (BART), we investigate risk-related decision-making when the likelihood of success and failure is unknown to participants. We present a novel performance metric for the BART that compares participant performance to optimal performance, eliminating the issue of data censorship associated with traditional performance metrics. We evaluate a model of BART decision-making and use it to generate representations of subjective risk, reward, and value in order to relate these model-predicted time series with hemodynamic response via fMRI. We then investigate asymmetries in behavior in the contexts of risk taking versus risk avoidance.
Fenton, Adam. Development of Novel Generative Models of Sequentially Dependent Decision Making in Risk-Ambiguous Environments. University of Virginia, Psychology - Graduate School of Arts and Sciences, PHD (Doctor of Philosophy), 2023-09-26, https://doi.org/10.18130/9zv7-9r49.
