When I'm 64 (2006) / Chapter Skim
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A Review of Decision-Making Processes: Weighing the Risks and Benefits of Aging
A Review of Decision-Making Processes: Weighing the Risks and Benefits of Aging
Pages 145-173
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Often their life circumstances are changing. A decision to retire is likely to be followed by the need to make many other decisions about how to structure everyday life.
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The first is a surprising lack of age differences in dealing with risky decisions, contrary to general stereotypes about increased cautiousness with age. Next, I review what seem to be the most frequently replicated age differences in decision making: older adults are
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The causes of each of these age differences (or lack thereof) have not yet been identified, but I suggest ways in which they may be related to emotional and prefrontal functioning.
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, and are more likely to show memory distortion that favors chosen options over rejected options (Mather and Johnson, 2000)
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. Two distinct regions within the prefrontal cortex contribute in different ways to decision processes: the orbitofrontal cortex and the dorsolateral prefrontal cortex (Krawczyk, 2002)
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. The dorsolateral prefrontal cortex also contributes to decision making, but not in ways that are as striking as those of the orbitofrontal cortex.
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. Researchers have attributed many of the cognitive changes seen in normal aging to changes in the prefrontal cortex (Daigneault and Braun, 1993; Moscovitch and Winocur, 1995; West, 1996)
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The decrease across the life span in negative emotions (such as fear, anger, sadness, and disgust) (Carstensen et al., 2000; Charles et al., 2001; Mroczek, 2001)
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Evidence from experiments comparing individual decision-making strategies among younger and older adults provides even less support for the stereotype of cautious older adults. Two studies found no significant age differences in whether people selected cards from high-reward/high-risk
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. There were no age differences in risk taking or in the response times based on the level of risk.
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. In summary, this pattern of little or no age differences in risky decisions runs counter to popular beliefs that older adults are less likely to make risky decisions.
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Interviews revealed that, instead of actually deciding against the treatment, the older adults tended to defer the decision until some undetermined later date. Thus, what appeared on the surface to be a decision was actually just an unwillingness to finalize the decision, making older adults appear to be risk avoidant.
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An interesting point when considering age differences is that the negative consequences of decision avoidance often do not become apparent immediately but instead emerge over time. In the short run, actions are more likely to be regretted than inactions (Gilovich and Medvec, 1995)
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. Seeking Information In everyday life, it often takes some effort to learn about the characteristics of choice options.
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Johnson (1997) investigated the impact of a memory aid on information seeking during decision making but, since the control condition in her experiment did not replicate previous findings of age differences in information seeking, the findings are difficult to interpret.
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before shifting to examine information about another dimension. A possible explanation for these results that was not suggested by Johnson is that these age differences are due to changes in the extent to which people engage in emotion regulation strategies.
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, but little is known about whether there are age differences in confidence about decisions. Several studies provide some initial evidence but it is somewhat contradictory.
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Two studies investigating age differences in memory for choices suggest that older adults may be more likely to repeatedly choose the same options because their memories are biased in favor of their past choices (Mather and Carstensen, 2004; Mather and Johnson, 2000)
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The American Association of Retired Persons (AARP) recently conducted several studies to try to understand the personality and demographic characteristics associated with susceptibility to phone scams and to test various interventions to decrease susceptibility (AARP Foundation, 2003)
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CONCLUSION When it comes to making decisions, older adults feel relatively confident about their abilities. When asked whether they expected to have problems making decisions as they got older, 37 percent of respondents between the ages of 35 and 49 said yes, whereas only 6 percent of the older adults said they have problems making decisions (Princeton Survey Research, 1998)
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Research has also revealed age differences in the way that people remember past decisions. These age-related patterns of memory bias may
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. Insensitivity to future consequences following damage to human prefrontal cortex.
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. Age differences in source forgetting: Effects on reality monitoring and on eyewitness testimony.
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. Adult age differences in monitoring of practical problem-solving per formance.
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. Age differences in decision making: A process methodology for examining strategic information processing.
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Organizational Behavior and Human Decision Processes, 81, 274-299. MacPherson, S.E., Phillips, L.H., and Della Sala, S
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. Age differences in the accuracy of confidence judg ments.
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Orga nizational Behavior and Human Decision Processes, 66, 228-236. Rolls, E.T., Hornak, J., Wade, D., and McGrath, J
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Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 60, 181-192. Yates, J.F., and Patalano, A.L.
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