Failure to Detect Mismatches Between Intention and Outcome in a Simple Decision Task

doi:10.1126/science.1111709

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Neuroscience

Science 7 October 2005:
Vol. 310. no. 5745, pp. 116 - 119
DOI: 10.1126/science.1111709

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Failure to Detect Mismatches Between Intention and Outcome in a Simple Decision Task

Petter Johansson,¹^* Lars Hall,¹^* Sverker Sikström,¹ Andreas Olsson²

A fundamental assumption of theories of decision-making is thatwe detect mismatches between intention and outcome, adjust ourbehavior in the face of error, and adapt to changing circumstances.Is this always the case? We investigated the relation betweenintention, choice, and introspection. Participants made choicesbetween presented face pairs on the basis of attractiveness,while we covertly manipulated the relationship between choiceand outcome that they experienced. Participants failed to noticeconspicuous mismatches between their intended choice and theoutcome they were presented with, while nevertheless offeringintrospectively derived reasons for why they chose the way theydid. We call this effect choice blindness.

¹ Lund University Cognitive Science, Lund University, Kungshuset Lundagård, 222 22 Lund, Sweden.
² Department of Psychology, New York University, 6 Washington Place, New York, NY 10003, USA.

^* These authors contributed equally to this work.

To whom correspondence should be addressed. E-mail: lars.hall{at}lucs.lu.se