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Sign effect in adolescents: Within‐subject comparison of delay discounting of hypothetical monetary gains and losses
Author(s) -
Furrebøe Elise Frølich
Publication year - 2020
Publication title -
journal of the experimental analysis of behavior
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 0.75
H-Index - 61
eISSN - 1938-3711
pISSN - 0022-5002
DOI - 10.1002/jeab.629
Subject(s) - sign (mathematics) , delay discounting , immediacy , discounting , psychology , temporal discounting , sign test , test (biology) , developmental psychology , audiology , social psychology , impulsivity , economics , medicine , mathematics , mathematical analysis , philosophy , pedagogy , paleontology , epistemology , finance , wilcoxon signed rank test , curriculum , biology
The purpose of this article is to contribute to the research on the sign effect, steeper discounting of gains compared to losses, by offering results from an experiment using a “double‐delay” procedure on adolescents. Twenty‐four 14‐year‐old schoolchildren completed a computer‐based test consisting of choices of Smaller–Sooner (SS) and Larger–Later (LL) hypothetical monetary gains and losses. Within‐subject comparison and analysis of the aggregated data were conducted. Current results were also examined in light of prior research with adult participants, and variations in behavioral patterns were identified. Although the sign effect appears to be more profound in adolescents compared to adults, the effect of immediacy persists regardless of the sign of the outcome, and zero discounting of losses is often the case, suggesting that the sign effect is driven largely by qualitative differences.