The Effect Of Task Character And Information Cognitive Ability On Choice Deferral In Decision-Making

According to the view of the Bounded Rationality Theory, this research adopted Mouselab procedure of the Information Board technique as the research approach which was used to research the process of decision-making. It took the simulation of the house-purchase event in real life as the experimental task, expecting to discuss how the individual made Choice deferral in the process of decision-making in the prospect of the character of decision task and the individualality of the decision-maker. This research considered two variables, the Attribute alignability and the number of Alternatives of the decision task, aiming to exploring how the individual made Choice deferral in the process of decision-making. Former researches discussed the individual decision-making in the prospect of the character of decision task or the individualality of the decision-maker alone.On purpose of improving ecological validity, this research took, based on the character of decision task , the cognitive capacity of information which was part of the individualality of the decision-maker to investigate whether it will affect the Choice deferral in the process of decision-making.The preliminary experiment offered the essential experiment material for formal experiment. In the preliminary experiment, the experimenter offered some attribute factors influencing individuals to purchase real estate. The reseach selected several kinds of important attribute factors which obtained through a long-term follow-up research in consumers by one real estate trade Co. in Peking according to the subjects' evaluation to the attribute factors.The first experiment mainly discussed the influence of Attribute alignability and the number of Alternatives on the Choice deferral in decision-making in the prospect of the character of decision task. The results indicated that Attribute alignability and the number of Alternatives had the unsignificant interaction on the speed of information search and the significant interaction on the depth of information search. The number of Alternatives had the significant main effect on the depth of information search. According to the difference in Nonattribute alignability, increasing the number of Alternatives would decrease the depth of information search, which reduced the Choice deferral.The second experiment took the individuality of the decision-maker into account to discuss the influence of the two on Choice deferral in the process of decision-making on the basis of decision task character. The results indicated that Attribute alignability and Cognitive ability of information had the significant interaction on the speed of information search. The number of Alternatives and Cognitive ability of information had the marginal significant interaction on the depth of information search, and the Cognitive capacity of information had the significant main effect on Choice deferral. In other words, the depth of information search increased on the condition of the high cognitive capacity of information.The result of this research basically supported the Bounded Rationality Theory. This research went from two different angles, the character of decision task and the individualality of the decision-maker. Not only did it enrich the research about Choice deferral in the domain of decision-making theoretically but also it made ecological validity better.The further research will specify the different domains and different profession categories in order to understand the Choice deferral more deeply. Not only the interaction between the social situation character and the character of decision task but also the interaction among social situation character and the character of decision task and decision-maker's individuality may be topics of further researches.