Impulsive People Have a Compulsion for Immediate Gratification - Certain or Uncertain

Publication Date

2015

Description

Impulsivity has been defined as choosing the smaller more immediate reward over a larger more delayed reward. The purpose of this research was to gain a deeper understanding of the mental processes involved in the decision making. We examined participants' rates of delay discounting and probability discounting to determine their correlation with time-probability trade-offs. To establish the time-probability trade-off rate, participants adjusted a risky, immediate payoff to a delayed, certain payoff. In effect, this yielded a probability equivalent of waiting time. We found a strong, positive correlation between delay discount rates and the time-probability trade-offs. This means that impulsive people have a compulsion for immediate gratification, independent of whether the immediate reward is certain or uncertain. Thus, they seem not to be concerned with risk but rather with time.

Journal

Frontiers in Psychology

Volume

6

First Page

515

Department

Managing for Sustainability

DOI

10.3389/fpsyg.2015.00515

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