Melissa Bateson

Bio: Melissa Bateson is an academic researcher from Newcastle University. The author has contributed to research in topics: Sturnus & Foraging. The author has an hindex of 44, co-authored 139 publications receiving 8071 citations. Previous affiliations of Melissa Bateson include University of Newcastle & Duke University.

Cues of being watched enhance cooperation in a real-world setting

Abstract: We examined the effect of an image of a pair of eyes on contributions to an honesty box used to collect money for drinks in a university coffee room. People paid nearly three times as much for their drinks when eyes were displayed rather than a control image. This finding provides the first evidence from a naturalistic setting of the importance of cues of being watched, and hence reputational concerns, on human cooperative behaviour.

Risky Theories—The Effects of Variance on Foraging Decisions

Abstract: SYNOPSIS This paper concerns the response of foraging animals to variability in rate of gain, or risk. Both the empirical and theoretical literatures relevant to this issue are reviewed. The methodology and results from fifty-nine studies in which animals are required to choose between foraging options differing in the variances in the rate of gain available are tabulated. We found that when risk is generated by variability in the amount of reward, animals are most frequently risk-averse and sometimes indifferent to risk, although in some studies preference depends on energy budget. In contrast, when variability is in delay to reward, animals are universally risk-prone. A range of functional, descriptive and mechanistic accounts for these findings is described, none of which alone is capable of accommodating all aspects of the data. Risk-sensitive foraging theory provides the only currently available explanation for why energy budget should affect preference. An information-processing model that incorporates Weber's law provides the only general explanation for why animals should be risk-averse with variability in amount and risk-prone with delay. A theory based on the mechanisms of associative learning explains quantitative aspects of risk-proneness for delay; specifically why the delay between choice and reward should have a stronger impact on preference than delays between the reward and subsequent choice. It also explains why animals should appear to commit the "fallacy of the average," maximising the expected ratio of amount of reward over delay to reward when computing rates rather than the ratio of expected amount over expected delay. We conclude that only a fusion of functional and mechanistic thinking will lead to progress in the understanding of animal decision making.

Thinking fast and slow.

Abstract: In 1974 an article appeared in Science magazine with the dry-sounding title “Judgment Under Uncertainty: Heuristics and Biases” by a pair of psychologists who were not well known outside their discipline of decision theory. In it Amos Tversky and Daniel Kahneman introduced the world to Prospect Theory, which mapped out how humans actually behave when faced with decisions about gains and losses, in contrast to how economists assumed that people behave. Prospect Theory turned Economics on its head by demonstrating through a series of ingenious experiments that people are much more concerned with losses than they are with gains, and that framing a choice from one perspective or the other will result in decisions that are exactly the opposite of each other, even if the outcomes are monetarily the same. Prospect Theory led cognitive psychology in a new direction that began to uncover other human biases in thinking that are probably not learned but are part of our brain’s wiring.

Citation classic - optimal foraging - a selective review of theory and tests

Abstract: Beginning with Emlen (1966) and MacArthur and Pianka (1966) and extending through the last ten years, several authors have sought to predict the foraging behavior of animals by means of mathematical models. These models are very similar,in that they all assume that the fitness of a foraging animal is a function of the efficiency of foraging measured in terms of some "currency" (Schoener, 1971) -usually energy- and that natural selection has resulted in animals that forage so as to maximize this fitness. As a result of these similarities, the models have become known as "optimal foraging models"; and the theory that embodies them, "optimal foraging theory." The situations to which optimal foraging theory has been applied, with the exception of a few recent studies, can be divided into the following four categories: (1) choice by an animal of which food types to eat (i.e., optimal diet); (2) choice of which patch type to feed in (i.e., optimal patch choice); (3) optimal allocation of time to different patches; and (4) optimal patterns and speed of movements. In this review we discuss each of these categories separately, dealing with both the theoretical developments and the data that permit tests of the predictions. The review is selective in the sense that we emphasize studies that either develop testable predictions or that attempt to test predictions in a precise quantitative manner. We also discuss what we see to be some of the future developments in the area of optimal foraging theory and how this theory can be related to other areas of biology. Our general conclusion is that the simple models so far formulated are supported are supported reasonably well by available data and that we are optimistic about the value both now and in the future of optimal foraging theory. We argue, however, that these simple models will requre much modification, espicially to deal with situations that either cannot easily be put into one or another of the above four categories or entail currencies more complicated that just energy.

The Dishonesty of Honest People: A Theory of Self-Concept Maintenance

Abstract: Dishonesty plays a large role in the economy. Causes for (dis)honest behavior seem to be based partially on external rewards, and partially on internal rewards. Here, we investigate how such external and internal rewards work in concert to produce (dis)honesty. We propose and test a theory of self-concept maintenance that allows people to engage to some level in dishonest behavior, thereby benefiting from external benefits of dishonesty, while maintaining their positive view about themselves in terms of being honest individuals. The results show that (1) given the opportunity to engage in beneficial dishonesty, people will engage in such behaviors; (2) the amount of dishonesty is largely insensitive to either the expected external benefits or the costs associated with the deceptive acts; (3) people know about their actions but do not update their self-concepts; (4) causing people to become more aware of their internal standards for honesty decreases their tendency for deception; and (5) increasing the "degrees of freedom" that people have to interpret their actions increases their tendency for deception. We suggest that dishonesty governed by self-concept maintenance is likely to be prevalent in the economy, and understanding it has important implications for designing effective methods to curb dishonesty.Former working paper titles:“(Dis)Honesty: A Combination of Internal and External Rewards” and "Almost Honest: Internal and External Motives for Honesty")

What makes us tick? Functional and neural mechanisms of interval timing

Abstract: Time is a fundamental dimension of life. It is crucial for decisions about quantity, speed of movement and rate of return, as well as for motor control in walking, speech, playing or appreciating music, and participating in sports. Traditionally, the way in which time is perceived, represented and estimated has been explained using a pacemaker-accumulator model that is not only straightforward, but also surprisingly powerful in explaining behavioural and biological data. However, recent advances have challenged this traditional view. It is now proposed that the brain represents time in a distributed manner and tells the time by detecting the coincidental activation of different neural populations.