THE INTERACTION BETWEEN THE RELATIVE ACCURACY OF PROBABILISTIC VS. DETERMINISTIC PREDICTIONS AND THE LEVEL OF PREDICTION‐TASK DIFFICULTY*

An experimental paradigm was constructed to assess the impact of prediction-task difficulty on the relative accuracy of probabilistic versus deterministic predictions. The results strongly support the hypothesis that the accuracy of probabilistic versus deterministic predictions is related to the level of difficulty inherent in the prediction task. At low levels of prediction-task difficulty, deterministic predictions were mort accurate than probabilistic predictions; the converse was true at high levels of difficulty.

[1]  Robert L. Winkler,et al.  Probabilistic Prediction: Some Experimental Results , 1971 .

[2]  G. R. Chesley.  The Elicitation of Subjective Probabilities: A Laboratory Study in an Accounting Context , 1976 .

[3]  David H. Gustafson,et al.  Evaluation of probabilistic information processing in medical decision making , 1969 .

[4]  A. H. Murphy,et al.  Credible Interval Temperature Forecasting: Some Experimental Results , 1974 .

[5]  Ralf E. Schaefer,et al.  The assessment of subjective probability distributions: A training experiment☆ , 1973 .

[6]  Carl-Axel S. Staël von Holstein,et al.  Probabilistic forecasting: An experiment related to the stock market , 1972 .

[7]  Karl Halvor Teigen,et al.  Overestimation of subjective probabilities , 1974 .

[8]  Norman L. Eckel.  THE IMPACT OF PROBABILISTIC INFORMATION ON DECISION BEHAVIOR AND PERFORMANCE IN AN EXPERIMENTAL GAME , 1983 .

[9]  J. E. Selvidge,et al.  ASSESSING THE EXTREMES OF PROBABILITY DISTRIBUTIONS BY THE FRACTILE METHOD , 1980 .

[10]  Bernard Alpert.  Non-businessmen as surrogates for businessmen in behavioral experiments , 1967 .

[11]  Robin M. Hogarth,et al.  Cognitive Processes and the Assessment of Subjective Probability Distributions , 1975 .

[12]  C. Holstein.  An Experiment in Probabilistic Weather Forecasting , 1971 .

[13]  R. Ashton,et al.  Students As Surrogates In Behavioral Accounting Research - Some Evidence , 1980 .

[14]  A. H. Murphy,et al.  credible interval temperature forecasts , 1972 .

[15]  John H. Murphy,et al.  Are Students Real People , 1974 .

[16]  Michael L Donnell,et al.  Intrasubject comparison of four response modes for “subjective probability” assessment , 1973 .

[17]  Robert L. Winkler,et al.  The Consensus of Subjective Probability Distributions , 1968 .

[18]  J. B. Wallace,et al.  A STUDY OF THE PERFORMANCE OF SUBJECTIVE PROBABILITY ASSESSORS , 1974 .