Assessing the Sensitivity, Composition, and Effects of Information Distortion
Seth A. Miller · OhioLink ETD Center (Ohio Library and Information Network) · 2014
The emergence of a leading alternative during the course of a decision is known to bias the evaluation of new information, producing an advantage for the tentatively preferred alternative.This process, known as information distortion, has been observed across a wide variety of circumstances.In three experiments, I address some unexamined and under-examined questions concerning information distortion.Experiment 1 examines the sensitivity of information distortion to different decision domains and repeated similar decisions.Experiment 2 disentangles positive distortion of information about a leading option (proleader distortion) from negative distortion of information about a trailing option (antitrailer distortion), while simultaneously examining the influence of these two components of distortion on choices and postchoice memory.Potential moderators are also examined.Experiment 3 replicates and extends earlier findings by examining proleader and antitrailer distortion in a larger choice set.Resultssuggest that information distortion is a robust phenomenon that has a substantial impact on participants' final choices, with both proleader and antitrailer distortion playing a role.Furthermore, participants' predecisional distortion of alternatives' features was related to their postchoice memory for those features, with positive and negative distortions of information predicting corresponding memory responses.Implications and connections to existing literature are discussed.