Regulating Emotions during Difficult Multiattribute Decision Making: The Role of Pre-Decisional Coherence Shifting

Almost all real-life decisions entail attribute conflict; every serious choice alternative is better than its competitors on some attribute dimensions but worse on others. In pre-decisional "coherence shifting," the decision maker gradually softens that conflict psychologically to the poin...

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Bibliographic Details
Published in:PloS one 2016-03, Vol.11 (3), p.e0150873-e0150873
Main Authors: Carpenter, Stephanie M, Yates, J Frank, Preston, Stephanie D, Chen, Lydia
Format: Article
Language:English
Subjects:
Adult
Appraisals
Biology and Life Sciences
Choice Behavior
Coherence
Conductance
Conflict (Psychology)
Decision Making
Decision Support Techniques
Decision theory
Discomfort
Emotions
Female
Humans
Male
Marketing
Medicine and Health Sciences
Motivation
People and Places
Psychological aspects
Resistance
Skin
Social Sciences
Vacations
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Summary:Almost all real-life decisions entail attribute conflict; every serious choice alternative is better than its competitors on some attribute dimensions but worse on others. In pre-decisional "coherence shifting," the decision maker gradually softens that conflict psychologically to the point where one alternative is seen as dominant over its competitors, or nearly so. Specifically, weaknesses of the eventually chosen alternative come to be perceived as less severe and less important while its strengths seem more desirable and significant. The research described here demonstrates that difficult multiattribute decision problems are aversive and that pre-decisional coherence shifting aids individuals in regulating that emotional discomfort. Across three studies, attribute conflict was confirmed to be aversive (Study 1), and skin conductance responses and ratings of decision difficulty both decreased in participants who coherence shifted (Study 2). Coherence shifting was also diminished among decision makers who were depleted of regulatory resources, known to be required for common emotion regulation mechanisms. Further, coherence shifting was shown to be relatively common among people who reported strong suppression tendencies in everyday emotion regulation (Study 3). Overall, the data suggest that, at least in part, coherence shifting serves as a tool that helps decision makers manage the pre-decisional discomfort generated by attribute conflict. Theoretical and practical implications are discussed.
ISSN:1932-6203
1932-6203
DOI:10.1371/journal.pone.0150873