Decision moving window: Using interactive eye tracking to examine decision processes

Abstract

It has become increasingly more important for researchers to better capture the complexities of making a decision. To better measure cognitive processes such as attention during decision making, we introduce a new methodology: the decision moving window, which capitalizes on both mouse-tracing and eye-tracking methods. We demonstrate the effectiveness of this methodology in a probabilistic inferential decision task where we reliably measure attentional processing during decision making while allowing the person to determine how information is acquired. We outline the advantages of this methodological paradigm and how it can advance both decision-making research and the development of new metrics to capture cognitive processes in complex tasks. © 2011 Psychonomic Society, Inc.