社會風險決策實驗任務之編修與效度檢驗

Abstract

近年來，學者認為，行為決策的偏差導因於情緒-認知歷程間的失衡，哥倫比亞卡片任務(CCT)因此 被提出用以測量個人在風險決策中的情緒和認知歷程，但至今該任務測量的建構效度如何，仍不清楚， 並且原任務設計除了在實施上較為複雜且耗時外，在決策歷程中也僅考量分數的得失變化，未考量社會 因素(如:同儕與社會酬賞)對青少年風險決策歷程的影響。本研究主要目的在於，參考與修正(簡 化)原CCT任務設計，並增加同儕決策的社會參照與同儕認同的社會酬賞情境設計於修正版的CCT風險 決策任務中，衡鑑該社會風險決策任務的建構效度。本研究以269位八年級學生為對象，採多層次驗證 性因素分析考量資料巢套結構對分析結果的影響。研究結果顯示:(1)簡化後的原CCT任務可有效激 發情緒與認知歷程。(2)融入社會因素的CCT任務亦能有效激發社會參照與社會酬賞對決策的影響。 (3)本研究編修的社會風險決策任務具有良好的建構效度。根據研究結果，未來研究可運用該測量工 具，理解青少年行為的風險決策對認知與行為表現的影響。  Risky decisions increase with age and reach peaks in adolescence and early adulthood before declining again during adulthood. Although risky decisions are commonly made by adolescents, it may have long-term negative impacts on life later. The Iowa Gambling Task (IGT), proposed about three decades ago, is the most common task used to investigate risky decision-making. It was developed based on the somatic marker hypothesis, which assumed that individuals’ behaviors are implicitly influenced by reward and punishment experiences, and these experiences would send emotional information to drive individuals’ decision-making behaviors toward beneficial long-term directions. However, only the emotional decision-making process was addressed in IGT, which may not sufficiently account for adolescents’ risky decision processes. Recently, cognitive neuroscience research suggested that risky decision-making involves two systems in the brain. Risky decision-making increases between childhood and adolescence as a result of changes around the time of puberty of the brain’s socio-emotional system that leads to increased reward-seeking, especially when peers are present. The socio-emotional system has been shown to rely on the ventral tegmentum area, subcortical structures (ventral striatum and amygdala) and cortical structures (the insular and medial/orbital frontal cortex). This system is operated automatically based on similarity and contiguity, and behavior is influenced by emotional impulse. Risky decision-making decreases between adolescence and adulthood because of changes in the brain’s cognitive-control system – changes which improve individuals’ ability for self-control, which occur gradually and over the course of adolescence and young adulthood. The cognitive-control system is assumed to rely on the dorsal and ventral area of the lateral prefrontal cortex and posterior parietal cortex. The differing timetables of these two brain systems make mid-adolescence a time of heightened vulnerability to make risky decisions. Consequently, researchers tended to argue that biased behavioral decision making was due to an imbalance between emotion and cognition processes. The Columbia Card Task (CCT) was proposed to measure individuals’ emotion and cognition processes in decision making. However, the construct validity of this measurement was unclear, and it was not only complex and time- consuming in the implementation of the original task design but also considered the changes of scores instead of including the effects of social factors (i.e., peers and social reward) on decision making processes. The main purpose of this study was referring and revising (simplifying) the original design of CCT and adding other tasks that incorporated social reference of peers’ decisions and social rewards of recognition into a revised CCT task to evaluate the construct validity of this social risky decision-making task. There were 269 eighth graders who consented to participate in this study, and multilevel confirmatory factor analysis was conducted to take into account nesting structure. The results showed: (1) The original design of CCT with minor revisions (reducing decision options from three to two) was effective in eliciting emotion and cognition processes. (2) Simplified CCT tasks incorporating social factors were also effective in eliciting the effects of social reference and social reward. (3) The social risky decision-making task held good construct validity. Future studies are encouraged to utilize this measurement to understand the effects of adolescents’ risky decision-making on cognition and behavior. For guidance and counseling practices, it is encouraged to understand the extent of risky decision-making for adolescents through present tasks to identify adolescents who are vulnerable to make risky decisions as early as possible and to regularly show care and help through guidance and counseling. Moreover, clarifying which adolescents are more likely to make risky decisions because of the presence of peers or social rewards helps to understand the potential impacts of risky decisions under different decision conditions. This study is beneficial for guidance and counseling practitioners to provide more precise interventions.