Anticipatory thinking (AT) and design have many commonalities. We identify three challenges for a... more Anticipatory thinking (AT) and design have many commonalities. We identify three challenges for all computational AT systems: representation, generation, and evaluation. We discuss how existing artificial intelligence techniques provide some methods for addressing these, but also fall significantly short. Next, we articulate where AT concepts appear in three computational design paradigms: configuration design, design for resilience, and conceptual design. We close by identifying two promising future directions at the intersection of AT and design: modeling other humans and new interfaces to support human decision‐makers.
Effective decision making in an uncertain world requires balancing the benefits of acquiring rele... more Effective decision making in an uncertain world requires balancing the benefits of acquiring relevant information with the costs of delaying choice. Optimal strategies for information sampling can be accurate but computationally expensive, whereas heuristic strategies are often computationally simple but rigid. To characterize the computations that underlie information sampling, we examined choice processes in human participants who sampled sequences of images (e.g. indoor and outdoor scenes) and attempted to infer the majority category (e.g. indoor or outdoor) under two reward conditions. We examined how behavior maps onto potential information sampling strategies. We found that choices were best described by a flexible function that lay between optimality and heuristics; integrating the magnitude of evidence favoring each category and the number of samples collected thus far. Integration of these criteria resulted in a trade-off between evidence and samples collected, in which the...
Efforts to explain complex human decisions have focused on competing theories emphasizing utility... more Efforts to explain complex human decisions have focused on competing theories emphasizing utility and narrative mechanisms. These are difficult to distinguish using behavior alone. Both narrative and utility theories have been proposed to explain juror decisions, which are among the most consequential complex decisions made in a modern society. Here, we use patterns of brain activation derived from large neuroimaging databases to look for signatures of the cognitive processes associated with different models of juror decision making. We asked jury-eligible subjects to rate the strength of a series of criminal cases while recording the resulting patterns of brain activation. We identified cognitive processes associated with the cumulative evidence presented. Evidence accumulation correlated with multiple narrative processes, including reading and recall. Of the cognitive processes traditionally viewed as components of utility, activation patterns associated with uncertainty, but not ...
In the present study, we aim to test several interventions to improve the accuracy of risk percep... more In the present study, we aim to test several interventions to improve the accuracy of risk perception with regards to the ongoing COVID-19 (Sars-Cov-2) pandemic. In an exploratory pilot study, we found that there is a striking disconnect between perceived risk and actual risk, but there were substantial individual differences in the accuracy of risk perception. Here, we will test four intervention conditions to assess whether presenting risk information in different ways increase the accuracy of risk perception.
Different advertising messages work for different people. Machine learning can be an effective wa... more Different advertising messages work for different people. Machine learning can be an effective way to personalise climate communications. In this paper we use machine learning to reanalyse findings from a recent study, showing that online advertisements increased some people’s belief in climate change while resulting in decreased belief in others. In particular, we show that the effect of the advertisements could change depending on people’s age and ethnicity.
Humans are particularly adept at modifying their behavior in accordance with changing environment... more Humans are particularly adept at modifying their behavior in accordance with changing environmental demands. Through various mechanisms of cognitive control, individuals are able to tailor actions to fit complex short- and long-term goals. The research described in this thesis uses functional magnetic resonance imaging to characterize the neural correlates of cognitive control at two levels of complexity: response inhibition and self-control in intertemporal choice. First, we examined changes in neural response associated with increased experience and skill in response inhibition; successful response inhibition was associated with decreased neural response over time in the right ventrolateral prefrontal cortex, a region widely implicated in cognitive control, providing evidence for increased neural efficiency with learned automaticity. We also examined a more abstract form of cognitive control using intertemporal choice. In two experiments, we identified putative neural substrates f...
Individuals are often faced with temptations that can lead them astray from long-term goals. We’r... more Individuals are often faced with temptations that can lead them astray from long-term goals. We’re interested in developing interventions that steer individuals toward making good initial decisions and then maintaining those decisions over time. In the realm of financial decision making, a particularly successful approach is the prize-linked savings account: individuals are incentivized to make deposits by tying deposits to a periodic lottery that awards bonuses to the savers. Although these lotteries have been very effective in motivating savers across the globe, they are a one-size-fits-all solution. We investigate whether customized bonuses can be more effective. We formalize a delayed-gratification task as a Markov decision problem and characterize individuals as rational agents subject to temporal discounting, a cost associated with effort, and fluctuations in willpower. Our theory is able to explain key behavioral findings in intertemporal choice. We created an online delayed-...
Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, 2021
Significance During the COVID-19 pandemic, individuals have been forced to balance conflicting ne... more Significance During the COVID-19 pandemic, individuals have been forced to balance conflicting needs: stay-at-home guidelines mitigate the spread of the disease but often at the expense of people’s mental health and economic stability. To balance these needs, individuals should be mindful of actual local virus transmission risk. We found that although pandemic-related risk perception was likely inaccurate, perceived risk closely predicted compliance with public health guidelines. Realigning perceived and actual risk is crucial for combating pandemic fatigue and slowing the spread of disease. Therefore, we developed a fast and effective intervention to realign perceived risk with actual risk. Our intervention improved perceived risk and reduced willingness to engage in risky activities, both immediately and after a 1- to 3-wk delay.
Jury decisions are among the most consequential social decisions in which bias plays a notable ro... more Jury decisions are among the most consequential social decisions in which bias plays a notable role. While courts take measures to reduce the influence of non-evidentiary factors, jurors may still incorporate biases into their decisions. One common bias, crime-type bias, is the extent to which the perceived strength of a prosecutor’s case depends on the severity of the crime. Moral judgment, affect, and social cognition have been proposed as core processes underlying this and other biases. Behavioral evidence alone has been insufficient to distinguish these explanations. To identify the mechanism underlying crime-type bias, we collected fMRI patterns of brain activation from mock jurors reading criminal scenarios. Brain patterns from crime-type bias were most similar to those associated with social cognition (mentalizing and racial bias) but not affect or moral judgment. Our results support a central role for social cognition in juror decisions and suggest crime-type bias and cultur...
Efforts to explain complex human decisions have focused on competing theories emphasizing utility... more Efforts to explain complex human decisions have focused on competing theories emphasizing utility and narrative mechanisms. These are difficult to distinguish using behavior alone. Both narrative and utility theories have been proposed to explain juror decisions, which are among the most consequential complex decisions made in a modern society. Here, we asked jury-eligible male and female subjects to rate the strength of a series of criminal cases while recording the resulting patterns of brain activation. We compared patterns of brain activation associated with evidence accumulation to patterns of brain activation derived from a large neuroimaging database to look for signatures of the cognitive processes associated with different models of juror decision making. Evidence accumulation correlated with multiple narrative processes, including reading and recall. Of the cognitive processes traditionally viewed as components of utility, activation patterns associated with uncertainty, b...
SummaryData analysis workflows in many scientific domains have become increasingly complex and fl... more SummaryData analysis workflows in many scientific domains have become increasingly complex and flexible. To assess the impact of this flexibility on functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) results, the same dataset was independently analyzed by 70 teams, testing nine ex-ante hypotheses. The flexibility of analytic approaches is exemplified by the fact that no two teams chose identical workflows to analyze the data. This flexibility resulted in sizeable variation in hypothesis test results, even for teams whose statistical maps were highly correlated at intermediate stages of their analysis pipeline. Variation in reported results was related to several aspects of analysis methodology. Importantly, meta-analytic approaches that aggregated information across teams yielded significant consensus in activated regions across teams. Furthermore, prediction markets of researchers in the field revealed an overestimation of the likelihood of significant findings, even by researchers with ...
Few studies have explored neural mechanisms of reward learning in ASD despite evidence of behavio... more Few studies have explored neural mechanisms of reward learning in ASD despite evidence of behavioral impairments of predictive abilities in ASD. To investigate the neural correlates of reward prediction errors in ASD, 16 adults with ASD and 14 typically developing controls performed a prediction error task during fMRI scanning. Results revealed greater activation in the ASD group in the left paracingulate gyrus during signed prediction errors and the left insula and right frontal pole during thresholded unsigned prediction errors. Findings support atypical neural processing of reward prediction errors in ASD in frontostriatal regions critical for prediction coding and reward learning. Results provide a neural basis for impairments in reward learning that may contribute to traits common in ASD (e.g., intolerance of unpredictability).
The Journal of neuroscience : the official journal of the Society for Neuroscience, Jan 23, 2015
The pervasive tendency to discount the value of future rewards varies considerably across individ... more The pervasive tendency to discount the value of future rewards varies considerably across individuals and has important implications for health and well-being. Here, we used fMRI with human participants to examine whether an individual's neural representation of an imagined primary reward predicts the degree to which the value of delayed monetary payments is discounted. Because future rewards can never be experienced at the time of choice, imagining or simulating the benefits of a future reward may play a critical role in decisions between alternatives with either immediate or delayed benefits. We found that enhanced ventromedial prefrontal cortex response during imagined primary reward receipt was correlated with reduced discounting in a separate monetary intertemporal choice task. Furthermore, activity in enhanced ventromedial prefrontal cortex during reward imagination predicted temporal discounting behavior both between- and within-individual decision makers with 62% and 73%...
Anticipatory thinking (AT) and design have many commonalities. We identify three challenges for a... more Anticipatory thinking (AT) and design have many commonalities. We identify three challenges for all computational AT systems: representation, generation, and evaluation. We discuss how existing artificial intelligence techniques provide some methods for addressing these, but also fall significantly short. Next, we articulate where AT concepts appear in three computational design paradigms: configuration design, design for resilience, and conceptual design. We close by identifying two promising future directions at the intersection of AT and design: modeling other humans and new interfaces to support human decision‐makers.
Effective decision making in an uncertain world requires balancing the benefits of acquiring rele... more Effective decision making in an uncertain world requires balancing the benefits of acquiring relevant information with the costs of delaying choice. Optimal strategies for information sampling can be accurate but computationally expensive, whereas heuristic strategies are often computationally simple but rigid. To characterize the computations that underlie information sampling, we examined choice processes in human participants who sampled sequences of images (e.g. indoor and outdoor scenes) and attempted to infer the majority category (e.g. indoor or outdoor) under two reward conditions. We examined how behavior maps onto potential information sampling strategies. We found that choices were best described by a flexible function that lay between optimality and heuristics; integrating the magnitude of evidence favoring each category and the number of samples collected thus far. Integration of these criteria resulted in a trade-off between evidence and samples collected, in which the...
Efforts to explain complex human decisions have focused on competing theories emphasizing utility... more Efforts to explain complex human decisions have focused on competing theories emphasizing utility and narrative mechanisms. These are difficult to distinguish using behavior alone. Both narrative and utility theories have been proposed to explain juror decisions, which are among the most consequential complex decisions made in a modern society. Here, we use patterns of brain activation derived from large neuroimaging databases to look for signatures of the cognitive processes associated with different models of juror decision making. We asked jury-eligible subjects to rate the strength of a series of criminal cases while recording the resulting patterns of brain activation. We identified cognitive processes associated with the cumulative evidence presented. Evidence accumulation correlated with multiple narrative processes, including reading and recall. Of the cognitive processes traditionally viewed as components of utility, activation patterns associated with uncertainty, but not ...
In the present study, we aim to test several interventions to improve the accuracy of risk percep... more In the present study, we aim to test several interventions to improve the accuracy of risk perception with regards to the ongoing COVID-19 (Sars-Cov-2) pandemic. In an exploratory pilot study, we found that there is a striking disconnect between perceived risk and actual risk, but there were substantial individual differences in the accuracy of risk perception. Here, we will test four intervention conditions to assess whether presenting risk information in different ways increase the accuracy of risk perception.
Different advertising messages work for different people. Machine learning can be an effective wa... more Different advertising messages work for different people. Machine learning can be an effective way to personalise climate communications. In this paper we use machine learning to reanalyse findings from a recent study, showing that online advertisements increased some people’s belief in climate change while resulting in decreased belief in others. In particular, we show that the effect of the advertisements could change depending on people’s age and ethnicity.
Humans are particularly adept at modifying their behavior in accordance with changing environment... more Humans are particularly adept at modifying their behavior in accordance with changing environmental demands. Through various mechanisms of cognitive control, individuals are able to tailor actions to fit complex short- and long-term goals. The research described in this thesis uses functional magnetic resonance imaging to characterize the neural correlates of cognitive control at two levels of complexity: response inhibition and self-control in intertemporal choice. First, we examined changes in neural response associated with increased experience and skill in response inhibition; successful response inhibition was associated with decreased neural response over time in the right ventrolateral prefrontal cortex, a region widely implicated in cognitive control, providing evidence for increased neural efficiency with learned automaticity. We also examined a more abstract form of cognitive control using intertemporal choice. In two experiments, we identified putative neural substrates f...
Individuals are often faced with temptations that can lead them astray from long-term goals. We’r... more Individuals are often faced with temptations that can lead them astray from long-term goals. We’re interested in developing interventions that steer individuals toward making good initial decisions and then maintaining those decisions over time. In the realm of financial decision making, a particularly successful approach is the prize-linked savings account: individuals are incentivized to make deposits by tying deposits to a periodic lottery that awards bonuses to the savers. Although these lotteries have been very effective in motivating savers across the globe, they are a one-size-fits-all solution. We investigate whether customized bonuses can be more effective. We formalize a delayed-gratification task as a Markov decision problem and characterize individuals as rational agents subject to temporal discounting, a cost associated with effort, and fluctuations in willpower. Our theory is able to explain key behavioral findings in intertemporal choice. We created an online delayed-...
Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, 2021
Significance During the COVID-19 pandemic, individuals have been forced to balance conflicting ne... more Significance During the COVID-19 pandemic, individuals have been forced to balance conflicting needs: stay-at-home guidelines mitigate the spread of the disease but often at the expense of people’s mental health and economic stability. To balance these needs, individuals should be mindful of actual local virus transmission risk. We found that although pandemic-related risk perception was likely inaccurate, perceived risk closely predicted compliance with public health guidelines. Realigning perceived and actual risk is crucial for combating pandemic fatigue and slowing the spread of disease. Therefore, we developed a fast and effective intervention to realign perceived risk with actual risk. Our intervention improved perceived risk and reduced willingness to engage in risky activities, both immediately and after a 1- to 3-wk delay.
Jury decisions are among the most consequential social decisions in which bias plays a notable ro... more Jury decisions are among the most consequential social decisions in which bias plays a notable role. While courts take measures to reduce the influence of non-evidentiary factors, jurors may still incorporate biases into their decisions. One common bias, crime-type bias, is the extent to which the perceived strength of a prosecutor’s case depends on the severity of the crime. Moral judgment, affect, and social cognition have been proposed as core processes underlying this and other biases. Behavioral evidence alone has been insufficient to distinguish these explanations. To identify the mechanism underlying crime-type bias, we collected fMRI patterns of brain activation from mock jurors reading criminal scenarios. Brain patterns from crime-type bias were most similar to those associated with social cognition (mentalizing and racial bias) but not affect or moral judgment. Our results support a central role for social cognition in juror decisions and suggest crime-type bias and cultur...
Efforts to explain complex human decisions have focused on competing theories emphasizing utility... more Efforts to explain complex human decisions have focused on competing theories emphasizing utility and narrative mechanisms. These are difficult to distinguish using behavior alone. Both narrative and utility theories have been proposed to explain juror decisions, which are among the most consequential complex decisions made in a modern society. Here, we asked jury-eligible male and female subjects to rate the strength of a series of criminal cases while recording the resulting patterns of brain activation. We compared patterns of brain activation associated with evidence accumulation to patterns of brain activation derived from a large neuroimaging database to look for signatures of the cognitive processes associated with different models of juror decision making. Evidence accumulation correlated with multiple narrative processes, including reading and recall. Of the cognitive processes traditionally viewed as components of utility, activation patterns associated with uncertainty, b...
SummaryData analysis workflows in many scientific domains have become increasingly complex and fl... more SummaryData analysis workflows in many scientific domains have become increasingly complex and flexible. To assess the impact of this flexibility on functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) results, the same dataset was independently analyzed by 70 teams, testing nine ex-ante hypotheses. The flexibility of analytic approaches is exemplified by the fact that no two teams chose identical workflows to analyze the data. This flexibility resulted in sizeable variation in hypothesis test results, even for teams whose statistical maps were highly correlated at intermediate stages of their analysis pipeline. Variation in reported results was related to several aspects of analysis methodology. Importantly, meta-analytic approaches that aggregated information across teams yielded significant consensus in activated regions across teams. Furthermore, prediction markets of researchers in the field revealed an overestimation of the likelihood of significant findings, even by researchers with ...
Few studies have explored neural mechanisms of reward learning in ASD despite evidence of behavio... more Few studies have explored neural mechanisms of reward learning in ASD despite evidence of behavioral impairments of predictive abilities in ASD. To investigate the neural correlates of reward prediction errors in ASD, 16 adults with ASD and 14 typically developing controls performed a prediction error task during fMRI scanning. Results revealed greater activation in the ASD group in the left paracingulate gyrus during signed prediction errors and the left insula and right frontal pole during thresholded unsigned prediction errors. Findings support atypical neural processing of reward prediction errors in ASD in frontostriatal regions critical for prediction coding and reward learning. Results provide a neural basis for impairments in reward learning that may contribute to traits common in ASD (e.g., intolerance of unpredictability).
The Journal of neuroscience : the official journal of the Society for Neuroscience, Jan 23, 2015
The pervasive tendency to discount the value of future rewards varies considerably across individ... more The pervasive tendency to discount the value of future rewards varies considerably across individuals and has important implications for health and well-being. Here, we used fMRI with human participants to examine whether an individual's neural representation of an imagined primary reward predicts the degree to which the value of delayed monetary payments is discounted. Because future rewards can never be experienced at the time of choice, imagining or simulating the benefits of a future reward may play a critical role in decisions between alternatives with either immediate or delayed benefits. We found that enhanced ventromedial prefrontal cortex response during imagined primary reward receipt was correlated with reduced discounting in a separate monetary intertemporal choice task. Furthermore, activity in enhanced ventromedial prefrontal cortex during reward imagination predicted temporal discounting behavior both between- and within-individual decision makers with 62% and 73%...
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Papers by Shabnam Hakimi