Hostname: page-component-cd9895bd7-gvvz8 Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-12-27T23:32:21.213Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

Discarding optimality: Throwing out the baby with the bathwater?

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  10 January 2019

Patrick Simen  and
Fuat Balcı
Patrick Simen
Affiliation:
Neuroscience Department, Oberlin College, OH 44074. psimen@oberlin.eduhttp://www.oberlin.edu/faculty/psimen/
Fuat Balcı
Affiliation:
Department of Psychology & Research Center for Translational Medicine, Koç University, 34450 Sarıyer/Istanbul, Turkey. fbalci@ku.edu.trhttps://tmdmlab.ku.edu.tr/
Get access Rights & Permissions [Opens in a new window]

Abstract

Rahnev & Denison (R&D) argue against normative theories and in favor of a more descriptive “standard observer model” of perceptual decision making. We agree with the authors in many respects, but we argue that optimality (specifically, reward-rate maximization) has proved demonstrably useful as a hypothesis, contrary to the authors’ claims.

Type
Open Peer Commentary
Information
Behavioral and Brain Sciences , Volume 41 , 2018 , e243
Copyright
Copyright © Cambridge University Press 2018 

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

References

Balcı, F., Freestone, D. & Gallistel, C. R. (2009) Risk assessment in man and mouse. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America 106(7):2459–63. Available at: http://www.pnas.org/content/106/7/2459.full.Google Scholar
Balcı, F., Freestone, D., Simen, P., deSouza, L., Cohen, J. D. & Holmes, P. (2011a) Optimal temporal risk assessment. Frontiers in Integrative Neuroscience 5:56. Available at: https://www.frontiersin.org/articles/10.3389/fnint.2011.00056/full.Google Scholar
Balcı, F., Simen, P., Niyogi, R., Saxe, A., Hughes, J. A., Holmes, P. & Cohen, J. D. (2011b) Acquisition of decision making criteria: Reward rate ultimately beats accuracy. Attention, Perception & Psychophysics 73(2):640–57. Retrieved September 11, 2015. Available at: http://www.pubmedcentral.nih.gov/articlerender.fcgi?artid=3383845&tool=pmcentrez&rendertype=abstract.Google Scholar
Bogacz, R., Brown, E., Moehlis, J., Holmes, P. & Cohen, J. D. (2006) The physics of optimal decision making: A formal analysis of models of performance in two-alternative forced-choice tasks. Psychological Review 113(4):700–65. Available at: http://doi.apa.org/getdoi.cfm?doi=10.1037/0033-295X.113.4.700.Google Scholar
Çavdaroglu, B., Zeki, M. & Balcı, F. (2014) Time-based reward maximization. Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society B: Biological Sciences 369(1637):20120461. Available at: http://rstb.royalsocietypublishing.org/content/369/1637/20120461.Google Scholar
Evans, N. J. & Brown, S. D. (2017) People adopt optimal policies in simple decision-making, after practice and guidance. Psychonomic Bulletin & Review 24:597–606. Available at: https://link.springer.com/article/10.3758%2Fs13423-016-1135-1.Google Scholar
Karşılar, H., Simen, P., Papadakis, S. & Balcı, F. (2014) Speed accuracy trade-off under response deadlines. Frontiers in Neuroscience 8:248. Available at: https://www.frontiersin.org/articles/10.3389/fnins.2014.00248/full.Google Scholar
McMillen, T. & Holmes, P. (2006) The dynamics of choice among multiple alternatives. Journal of Mathematical Psychology 50:30–57.Google Scholar
Simen, P., Balcı, F., deSouza, L., Holmes, P. & Cohen, J. D. (2011) A model of interval timing by neural integration. Journal of Neuroscience 31(25):9238–53. Available at: https://doi.org/10.1523/JNEUROSCI.3121-10.2011.Google Scholar
Simen, P., Cohen, J. D. & Holmes, P. (2006) Rapid decision threshold modulation by reward rate in a neural network. Neural Networks 19:1013–26. Available at: https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC1808344/.Google Scholar
Simen, P., Contreras, D., Buck, C., Hu, P., Holmes, P. & Cohen, J. D. (2009) Reward-rate optimization in two-alternative decision making: Empirical tests of theoretical predictions. Journal of Experimental Psychology: Human Perception and Performance 35:1865–97. Available at: http://dx.doi.org/10.1037/a0016926.Google Scholar
Starns, J. J. & Ratcliff, R. (2010) The effects of aging on the speed–accuracy compromise: Boundary optimality in the diffusion model. Psychology and Aging 25(2):377–90. Available at: http://dx.doi.org/10.1037/a0018022.Google Scholar