Novelty and uncertainty differentially drive exploration across development.

Area of Science:

• Cognitive Science
• Developmental Psychology
• Neuroeconomics

Background:

• Decision-making involves balancing exploitation of known rewards with exploration of unknown options.
• Previous research suggests children explore more than adults, but novelty and uncertainty are often confounded.
• Understanding developmental differences in exploration requires decoupling these factors.

Purpose of the Study:

• To investigate how novelty and reward uncertainty independently influence decision-making across development.
• To examine age-related changes in exploration and risk aversion from childhood to adulthood.

Main Methods:

• An adapted value-guided decision-making task was used to separate novelty and uncertainty.
• Participants aged 8-27 years (children, adolescents, adults; N=122) completed the task.
• Computational modeling analyzed choice behavior.

Main Results:

• Exploration significantly decreased with increasing age.
• A consistent novelty bias was observed across all age groups.
• Aversion to reward uncertainty increased with age, particularly into adulthood.
• Adolescents and adults showed reduced uncertainty aversion for novel options, unlike children.

Conclusions:

• Developmental shifts in decision-making involve distinct trajectories for novelty seeking and uncertainty aversion.
• Children's choices are primarily driven by novelty, with less influence from reward uncertainty.
• Adolescents and adults exhibit more sophisticated value-based decision-making, integrating novelty and uncertainty information.