Open AccessIs cognitive impairment related to violations of rationality? A laboratory alcohol intoxication study testing transitivity of preference.
Author(s) -
Clintin P. DavisStober,
Denis M. McCarthy,
Daniel R. Cavagnaro,
Mason H. Price,
Nicholas J. L. Brown,
Sanghyuk Park
Publication year - 2019
Publication title -
decision
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
eISSN - 2325-9973
pISSN - 2325-9965
DOI - 10.1037/dec0000093
Subject(s) - transitive relation , rationality , alcohol intoxication , preference , psychology , cognitive impairment , cognition , alcohol , clinical psychology , psychiatry , medicine , medical emergency , statistics , mathematics , injury prevention , poison control , chemistry , philosophy , epistemology , biochemistry , combinatorics
Alcohol intoxication is well known to impair a number of cognitive abilities required for sound decision making. We tested whether an intoxicating dose of alcohol altered whether individuals satisfied a basic property of rational decision making, transitivity of preference. Our study was within-subjects in design and our analysis teased apart stable, yet error-prone, preferences from variable, error-free preferences. We find that alcohol intoxication does not appear to play a major role in determining whether subjects violate transitivity. For a minority of individuals, we find that alcohol intoxication does impact how they select among and/or perceive lotteries with similar attribute values. This, in turn, can cause them to alter various aspects of their preference structure.