Xing Cai, Isaacowitz Derek
Renmin University of China.
Int J Aging Hum Dev. 2011;73(4):299-312. doi: 10.2190/AG.73.4.b.
Previous studies suggested that older adults are more likely to engage in heuristic decision-making than young adults. This study used eye tracking technique to examine young adults' and highly educated older adults' attention toward two types of decision-relevant information: heuristic cue vs. factual cues. Surprisingly, highly educated older adults showed the reversed age pattern-they looked more toward factual cues than did young adults. This age difference disappeared after controlling for educational level. Additionally, education correlated with attentional pattern to decision-relevant information. We interpret this finding as an indication of the power of education: education may modify what are thought to be "typical" age differences in decision-making, and education may influence young and older people's decision-making via different paths.
以往的研究表明，与年轻人相比，老年人更倾向于采用启发式决策。本研究使用眼动追踪技术，考察了年轻人和高学历老年人对两种与决策相关信息的关注情况：启发式线索与事实性线索。令人惊讶的是，高学历老年人呈现出相反的年龄模式——他们比年轻人更关注事实性线索。在控制教育水平后，这种年龄差异消失了。此外，教育与对决策相关信息的注意模式相关。我们将这一发现解释为教育力量的一种体现：教育可能会改变人们认为的决策中“典型”的年龄差异，并且教育可能通过不同途径影响年轻人和老年人的决策。
