Flexible Bayesian approach for psychological modeling of decision making

Abstract

Proposed the flexible Bayesian approach (FBA) to describe the psychological decision making process and examined whether the FBA could explain some counter-intuitive examples. 142 undergraduates were surveyed to evaluate the subjective probabilities and the betting preferences in the Ellsberg's Urn Problem (EUP) by D. Ellsberg (1961) and the Three Prisoners Problem by F. Mosteller (1965). For the EUP, higher order probability was adequate to explain the paradox, more so than the non-additive representation of uncertainty. For the TPP, higher order mathematical probability failed to explain Ss' responses, which were against Bayesian probability. The fuzzy representation of higher order probability by means of the membership function was adequate for the explanation of the paradox. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2012 APA, all rights reserved)