Neural Diversity and Decisions

The present study measured nine physiologic factors and collected 16 types of psychological data while participants made decisions in standard tasks from experimental economics measuring risk aversion, intertemporal patience, altruism, cooperation, generosity, trust and trustworthiness. Robust predictors were defined as those that were statistically significant in both forward and backward stepwise regressions using all the collected independent variables. The analysis showed that multiple measures of physiologic stress decrease cooperative behaviors while testosterone consistently increased antisocial behaviors. Further, cognitive abilities robustly increased patience but decreased cooperation while those more satisfied with their lives were more trustworthy. Participants scoring high on the personality trait of Imagination were shown to be less altruistic and generous, while those high on Neuroticism were more prosocial.