Faculty Collaboration Database

Myopia for the future or hypersensitivity to reward? Age-related changes in decision making on the Iowa Gambling Task. Emotion 2013 Feb;13(1):19-24

Date

10/11/2012

Pubmed ID

23046455

Pubmed Central ID

PMC3965348

DOI

10.1037/a0029970

Scopus ID

2-s2.0-84880950380 (requires institutional sign-in at Scopus site)   23 Citations

Abstract

It has been shown that older adults perform less well than younger adults on the Iowa Gambling Task (IGT), a real-world type decision-making task that factors together reward, punishment, and uncertainty. To explore the reasons behind this age-related decrement, we administered to an adult life span sample of 265 healthy participants (Mdn age = 62.00 +/- 16.17 years; range [23-88]) 2 versions of the IGT, which have different contingencies for successful performance: A'B'C'D' requires choosing lower immediate reward (paired with lower delayed punishment); E'F'G'H' requires choosing higher immediate punishment (paired with higher delayed reward). There was a significant negative correlation between age and performance on the A'B'C'D' version of the IGT (r = -.16, p = .01), while there was essentially no correlation between age and performance on the E'F'G'H' version (r = -.07, p = .24). In addition, the rate of impaired performance in older participants was significantly higher for the A'B'C'D' version (23%) compared with the E'F'G'H' version (13%). A parsimonious account of these findings is an age-related increase in hypersensitivity to reward, whereby the decisions of older adults are disproportionately influenced by prospects of receiving reward, irrespective of the presence or degree of punishment.

Author List

Bauer AS, Timpe J, Edmonds EC, Bechara A, Tranel D, Denburg NL

Author

Joshua C. Timpe MD Assistant Professor in the Emergency Medicine department at Medical College of Wisconsin

MESH terms used to index this publication - Major topics in bold

Adult
Age Factors
Aged
Aged, 80 and over
Aging
Decision Making
Forecasting
Gambling
Humans
Middle Aged
Neuropsychological Tests
Punishment
Reward
Uncertainty
Young Adult