使用外语能降低经济决策偏差吗?来自实验室的证据

Can Using Foreign Languages Reduce Decision-making Bias?Evidence from the Laboratory

文章旨在检验使用外语对经济决策的两类核心问题,即不确定性(风险、模糊性)决策和跨期决策的偏差是否产生影响。两组实验被试被随机分到母语组和外语组,分别采用母语和外语完成一系列决策任务。实验结果发现使用外语能够显著降低与风险相关的决策偏差,但并不能降低与模糊性和跨期决策有关的决策偏差。具体而言,在与框架效应有关的风险决策任务中,使用外语显著减少了决策的框架效应;与母语组相比,在与小额金钱、大额金钱有关的风险决策问题中,外语组的反射效应消失了;外语组的阿莱行为也显著减少。在模糊性决策任务中,母语组与外语组在决策偏差上没有显著差异。在跨期决策任务中,使用外语对个体的焦虑程度没有显著的影响,但显著增加了双曲贴现偏好。这说明风险、模糊性和跨期决策所涉及的认知过程存在差异,使用外语对决策产生的作用具有复杂性。

The purpose of this paper is to investigate if the use of a foreign languages affects decision-making under uncertainty and intertemporal conditions.The experiment included several tasks,and two groups of subjects used their native language and foreign language to make decisions respectively.The experimental results show that the use of a foreign language could strengthens cognitive processing,which helps to reduce behavioral bias in risk decisions.M ore specifically,we found that foreign language tends to reduce the decision bias related to frame effect;in the moderate/longshot risk tasks,the reflection effect disappeared in foreign language group;besides,the foreign group exhibit significantly less Allais-type behavior compared to the native group.While there is no significant difference between the native and the foreign group in ambiguous decision-making.For decision making involving time,the use of a foreign language significantly increases the preference for hyperbolic discounting,but no significant effect on the degree of anxiousness.Those results reveal that the cognitive processes under risk,ambiguity and intertemporal conditions are different,and the effect of foreign language in decision-making is complex.