When uncertain, does human self-motion decision-making fully utilize complete information?

Area of Science:

• Cognitive Psychology
• Neuroscience
• Decision Science

Background:

• Human decision-making under uncertainty is debated, with some models assuming random guessing and others assuming full information utilization.
• Previous research has not experimentally confirmed whether humans fully utilize information when uncertain.

Purpose of the Study:

• To experimentally investigate whether humans fully utilize available information when making uncertain perceptual decisions.
• To compare human performance in binary (left/right) versus trinary (left/right/uncertain) forced-choice tasks.

Main Methods:

• Combined numerical simulations, theoretical analyses, and human studies.
• Utilized a self-motion direction-recognition task (left/right rotation).
• Instructed participants to make binary or trinary decisions based on cued stimuli.

Main Results:

• Humans do not guess randomly when uncertain.
• Human performance in binary and trinary decision tasks was statistically equivalent.
• Findings indicate full utilization of information even under uncertainty.

Conclusions:

• Humans fully utilize complete information when uncertain in perceptual decision-making tasks.
• Results unify signal detection theory with other decision-making models that incorporate uncertainty.
• Provides empirical evidence for informed decision-making despite subjective uncertainty.