Developmental changes in effects of risk and valence on adolescent decision-making

Abstract

Recent research on risky decision-making in adults has shown that both the risk in potential outcomes and their valence (i.e., whether those outcomes involve gains or losses) exert dissociable influences on decisions. We hypothesised that the influences of these two crucial decision variables (risk and valence) on decision-making would vary developmentally during adolescence. We adapted a risk-taking paradigm that provides precise metrics for the impacts of risk and valence. Decision-making in 11–16 year old female adolescents was influenced by both risk and valence. However, their influences assumed different developmental patterns: the impact of valence diminished with age, while there was no developmental change in the impact of risk. These different developmental patterns provide further evidence that risk and valence are fundamentally dissociable constructs and have different influences on decisions across adolescence.