Abstract
Nowadays, traditional values have been seriously impacted in China with the significant changes of the public's social life and the introduction of western values in social transition period (Li & Chen, 2016). Acquisition and consumption of materials have become an important way for most individuals to seek for success and happiness (Jiang, Yang, Yu, Liang, & Ke, 2015). And the tendency of materialism is becoming increasingly pervasive. The development of material values derived partly from personal psychological insecurity (Li, Guo, 2008). When psychology is in a state of insecurity, the individual will regard materialism as a compensation strategy to reduce the pain from insecurity (Sheldon & Kasser, 2008). Previous studies have shown that psychological insecurity can affect risk preference (Lu & Wang, 2016). However, research related to the influence of materialism on risk decision-making is rarely involved. Lopes (1987) suggested that individual risky decision-making can be interpreted as the result of interaction between individual factors and situational factors. At present, time pressure has been regarded as an important situational variable in the research of risky decision-making factors. But the effects of time pressure on individual risk preferences in previous studies are not consistent, which may be related to the type of decision-making task and individual variables (Inbar, Cone, & Gilovich, 2010). Therefore, this study aimed to investigate the impact of materialism and time pressure on risky decision-making.
According to the score of the subjects in the Material Value Scale, the top 27% of score were chosen as subjects for high materialism tendency; whereas the bottom 27% of score were chosen as subjects for low materialism tendency. Iowa Gambling Task and Balloon Analogue Risk Task were employed to explore risky decision-making in this research. The IGT revealed that there was a higher net score, greater decision performance and a higher final score for the no time-pressure group than the time-pressure group. And under time pressure, the net score and final profit of the high materialism group were significantly lower than those of the low materialism group. In addition, the BART revealed that there were more number of exploded balloons and more inflation number of unexploded balloons for the no time-pressure group than the time-pressure group. And under time pressure, the number of exploded balloons and inflation number of unexploded balloons in high materialism group were significantly more than those in the low materialism group. In short, this research indicated that the influence of material values on risk decision-making behavior is regulated by time pressure, that is, there is no significant difference in the risk decision-making behavior between high and low materialism group without time pressure, but in the time pressure condition, individuals with high materialistic tendency showed stronger risk preference than those with low materialistic tendency. In addition, this study also suggested that the impact of time pressure on risky decision-making is related to decision-making tasks. In BART, time pressure makes decision makers show risk aversion; in IGT, time pressure makes decision makers show risk seeking.
Cite this article
Download Citations
{{custom_sec.title}}
{{custom_sec.title}}
{{custom_sec.content}}