Premium
Fishing for the Right Words: Decision Rules for Human Foraging Behavior in Internal Search Tasks
Author(s) -
Wilke Andreas,
Hutchinson John M. C.,
Todd Peter M.,
Czienskowski Uwe
Publication year - 2009
Publication title -
cognitive science
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 1.498
H-Index - 114
eISSN - 1551-6709
pISSN - 0364-0213
DOI - 10.1111/j.1551-6709.2009.01020.x
Subject(s) - foraging , task (project management) , cognition , quality (philosophy) , optimal foraging theory , context (archaeology) , cognitive psychology , sequence (biology) , decision quality , psychology , random sequence , computer science , social psychology , communication , biology , mathematics , ecology , neuroscience , economics , genetics , knowledge management , distribution (mathematics) , paleontology , philosophy , team effectiveness , mathematical analysis , management , epistemology
Animals depleting one patch of resources must decide when to leave and switch to a fresh patch. Foraging theory has predicted various decision mechanisms; which is best depends on environmental variation in patch quality. Previously we tested whether these mechanisms underlie human decision making when foraging for external resources; here we test whether humans behave similarly in a cognitive task seeking internally generated solutions. Subjects searched for meaningful words made from random letter sequences, and as their success rate declined, they could opt to switch to a fresh sequence. As in the external foraging context, time since the previous success and the interval preceding it had a major influence on when subjects switched. Subjects also used the commonness of sequence letters as a proximal cue to patch quality that influenced when to switch. Contrary to optimality predictions, switching decisions were independent of whether sequences differed little or widely in quality.