The Framing of Decisions and the Evaluation of Prospects

Publisher Summary The chapter presents a series of demonstrations in which seemingly inconsequential changes in the formulation of choice problems caused significant shifts of preference. The inconsistencies were traced to the interaction of two sets of factors: variation in the framing of acts, contingencies and outcomes, and the characteristic non-linearities of values and decision weights. The demonstrated effects are large and systematic, although by no means universal. They occur when the outcomes concern the loss of human lives as well as in choices about money; they are not restricted to hypothetical questions and are not eliminated by monetary incentives. The chapter is concerned primarily with the descriptive question of how decisions are made and emphasizes that the psychology of choice is also relevant to the normative question of how decisions ought to be made. The framing of acts and outcomes can also reflect the acceptance or rejection of responsibility for particular consequences, and the deliberate manipulation of framing is commonly used as an instrument of self-control. When framing influences the experience of consequences, the adoption of a decision frame is an ethically significant act.