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11 - The Optimality of “Suboptimal” Choice

A Psycho-evolutionary Perspective

from Part I - Evolution of Learning Processes

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  26 May 2022

By
Patrick Anselme
Edited by
Mark A. Krause ,
Karen L. Hollis  and
Mauricio R. Papini
Mark A. Krause
Affiliation:
Southern Oregon University
Karen L. Hollis
Affiliation:
Mount Holyoke College, Massachusetts
Mauricio R. Papini
Affiliation:
Texas Christian University
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Summary

Incentive salience denotes the biopsychological process that enables reward-related cues to be approached. Accordingly, organisms often prefer a cue predictive of a food reward delivered with certainty over one predictive of the same reward delivered with uncertainty. However, a closer examination of free-choice behavior in various experimental designs suggests that the principle of reward maximization is an oversimplification. In particular, many studies of suboptimal choice (SOC) reveal that organisms exposed to conditioned stimuli may prefer a food option associated with a lower total amount and a lower probability of food to the more profitable alternative option. In this chapter, I argue that SOC illustrates one important fact: reward maximization can be a correlate of choice behavior but it is not its cause. Instead, organisms track the cues that reliably predict food delivery, independent of the amounts received or the probability of being rewarded. I show how to understand this process in psychological terms and also why this view may make more sense than reward maximization from an evolutionary perspective.

Keywords

suboptimal choicerewardstimulus reliabilitymaximizationoptimizationreward uncertainty
Type
Chapter
Information
Evolution of Learning and Memory Mechanisms , pp. 193 - 209
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
Print publication year: 2022

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