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Risk Taking for Potential Reward Decreases across the Lifespan
The extent to which aging affects decision-making is controversial. Given the critical financial decisions that older adults face (e.g., managing retirement funds), changes in risk preferences are of particular importance [1]. Although some studies have found that older individuals are more risk ave...
Autores principales: | , , , , , , , |
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Formato: | Online Artículo Texto |
Lenguaje: | English |
Publicado: |
Cell Press
2016
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Materias: | |
Acceso en línea: | https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4920952/ https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/27265392 http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.cub.2016.05.017 |
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author | Rutledge, Robb B. Smittenaar, Peter Zeidman, Peter Brown, Harriet R. Adams, Rick A. Lindenberger, Ulman Dayan, Peter Dolan, Raymond J. |
author_facet | Rutledge, Robb B. Smittenaar, Peter Zeidman, Peter Brown, Harriet R. Adams, Rick A. Lindenberger, Ulman Dayan, Peter Dolan, Raymond J. |
author_sort | Rutledge, Robb B. |
collection | PubMed |
description | The extent to which aging affects decision-making is controversial. Given the critical financial decisions that older adults face (e.g., managing retirement funds), changes in risk preferences are of particular importance [1]. Although some studies have found that older individuals are more risk averse than younger ones [2, 3, 4], there are also conflicting results, and a recent meta-analysis found no evidence for a consistent change in risk taking across the lifespan [5]. There has as yet been little examination of one potential substrate for age-related changes in decision-making, namely age-related decline in dopamine, a neuromodulator associated with risk-taking behavior. Here, we characterized choice preferences in a smartphone-based experiment (n = 25,189) in which participants chose between safe and risky options. The number of risky options chosen in trials with potential gains but not potential losses decreased gradually over the lifespan, a finding with potentially important economic consequences for an aging population. Using a novel approach-avoidance computational model, we found that a Pavlovian attraction to potential reward declined with age. This Pavlovian bias has been linked to dopamine, suggesting that age-related decline in this neuromodulator could lead to the observed decrease in risk taking. |
format | Online Article Text |
id | pubmed-4920952 |
institution | National Center for Biotechnology Information |
language | English |
publishDate | 2016 |
publisher | Cell Press |
record_format | MEDLINE/PubMed |
spelling | pubmed-49209522016-06-30 Risk Taking for Potential Reward Decreases across the Lifespan Rutledge, Robb B. Smittenaar, Peter Zeidman, Peter Brown, Harriet R. Adams, Rick A. Lindenberger, Ulman Dayan, Peter Dolan, Raymond J. Curr Biol Report The extent to which aging affects decision-making is controversial. Given the critical financial decisions that older adults face (e.g., managing retirement funds), changes in risk preferences are of particular importance [1]. Although some studies have found that older individuals are more risk averse than younger ones [2, 3, 4], there are also conflicting results, and a recent meta-analysis found no evidence for a consistent change in risk taking across the lifespan [5]. There has as yet been little examination of one potential substrate for age-related changes in decision-making, namely age-related decline in dopamine, a neuromodulator associated with risk-taking behavior. Here, we characterized choice preferences in a smartphone-based experiment (n = 25,189) in which participants chose between safe and risky options. The number of risky options chosen in trials with potential gains but not potential losses decreased gradually over the lifespan, a finding with potentially important economic consequences for an aging population. Using a novel approach-avoidance computational model, we found that a Pavlovian attraction to potential reward declined with age. This Pavlovian bias has been linked to dopamine, suggesting that age-related decline in this neuromodulator could lead to the observed decrease in risk taking. Cell Press 2016-06-20 /pmc/articles/PMC4920952/ /pubmed/27265392 http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.cub.2016.05.017 Text en © 2016 The Authors http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/ This is an open access article under the CC BY license (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/). |
spellingShingle | Report Rutledge, Robb B. Smittenaar, Peter Zeidman, Peter Brown, Harriet R. Adams, Rick A. Lindenberger, Ulman Dayan, Peter Dolan, Raymond J. Risk Taking for Potential Reward Decreases across the Lifespan |
title | Risk Taking for Potential Reward Decreases across the Lifespan |
title_full | Risk Taking for Potential Reward Decreases across the Lifespan |
title_fullStr | Risk Taking for Potential Reward Decreases across the Lifespan |
title_full_unstemmed | Risk Taking for Potential Reward Decreases across the Lifespan |
title_short | Risk Taking for Potential Reward Decreases across the Lifespan |
title_sort | risk taking for potential reward decreases across the lifespan |
topic | Report |
url | https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4920952/ https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/27265392 http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.cub.2016.05.017 |
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