The Effect Of Regulatory Focus And Decision Makers’Roles On Risk Decision

Regulatory focus theory as a new perspective motivation theory got the attention ofacademic when it has been proposed. In daily life and work, people always need to make avariety of decisions, and the risk decision is the most common type in daily behavior.Other than making decisions for oneself, making decisions for others is also quite commonand relates to many decision fields. The impact of decision makers’ roles on decisionbehaviors has received increasing attention from researchers and it has importanttheoretical and practical significance. This study first reviewes previous studies onregulatory focus theory, decision makers’ roles, framing effects and other related fields.What’s important, we want to discuss the effect of regulatory focus, framing effects anddecision makers’ roles on risk decision based on previous studies.The study includes three parts. Experiment1explores the effects of regulatory focustheory and framing effect on risk decision though paper–pencil test. The results revealedthat significant interactions between them on risk decision and the existence of regulatoryfit. Experiment2introduces decision makers’ roles, examine the effects of regulatory focustheory, framing effect and on decision makers’ roles on risk decision and found that theinteractions between decision makers’ roles and framing effect, regulatory focus theory andframing effect. It indicates that there is an obvious self–other decision making differences.Based on previous two studies, Experiment3adds interpersonal intimacy to explore theimpact on making risk decisions for others.Through the analysis of experimental data, we got the following conclusions:(1) The match of frame type and regulatory focus can generate the regulatory fit effect.Promotion focused person are more risk than prevention focused person under the gainframe, but under lost frame prevention focused person are more risk.(2) There’s a interaction of the decision makers’ roles and the regulatory focus hasimpacted on risk decision.(3) The interaction between the decision makers’ roles and the frame type has impacted on risk decision.(4) The interaction between the frame type and the interpersonal intimacy hasimpacted on making risk decisions for others.In the end, the whole study was summarized along with the discussion on the practicalimplications, limitations of this study, and potential future studies.