The common and distinct brain basis associated with adult and adolescent risk-taking behavior: Evidence from the neuroimaging meta-analysis

Risk-taking is a common, complex, and multidimensional behavior construct that has significant implications for human health and well-being. Previous research has identified the neural mechanisms underlying risk-taking behavior in both adolescents and adults, yet the differences between adolescents' and adults' risk-taking in the brain remain elusive. This study firstly employs a comprehensive meta-analysis approach that includes 73 adult and 20 adolescent whole-brain experiments, incorporating observations from 1986 adults and 789 adolescents obtained from online databases, including Web of Science, PubMed, ScienceDirect, Google Scholar and Neurosynth. It then combines functional decoding methods to identify common and distinct brain regions and corresponding psychological processes associated with risk-taking behavior in these two cohorts. The results indicated that the neural bases underlying risk-taking behavior in both age groups are situated within the cognitive control, reward, and sensory networks. Subsequent contrast analysis revealed that adolescents and adults risk-taking engaged frontal pole within the fronto-parietal control network (FPN), but the former recruited more ventrolateral area and the latter recruited more dorsolateral area. Moreover, adolescents' risk-taking evoked brain area activity within the ventral attention network (VAN) and the default mode network (DMN) compared with adults, consistent with the functional decoding analyses. These findings provide new insights into the similarities and disparities of risk-taking neural substrates underlying different age cohorts, supporting future neuroimaging research on the dynamic changes of risk-taking.

Sleep deprivation attenuates neural responses to outcomes from risky decision-making

Sleep loss impacts a broad range of brain and cognitive functions. However, how sleep deprivation affects risky decision-making remains inconclusive. This study used functional MRI to examine the impact of one night of total sleep deprivation (TSD) on risky decision-making behavior and the underlying brain responses in healthy adults. In this study, we analyzed data from N = 56 participants in a strictly controlled 5-day and 4-night in-laboratory study using a modified Balloon Analogue Risk Task. Participants completed two scan sessions in counter-balanced order, including one scan during rested wakefulness (RW) and another scan after one night of TSD. Results showed no differences in participants' risk-taking propensity and risk-induced activation between RW and TSD. However, participants showed significantly reduced neural activity in the anterior cingulate cortex and bilateral insula for loss outcomes, and in bilateral putamen for win outcomes during TSD compared with RW. Moreover, risk-induced activation in the insula negatively correlated with participants' risk-taking propensity during RW, while no such correlations were observed after TSD. These findings suggest that sleep loss may impact risky decision-making by attenuating neural responses to decision outcomes and impairing brain-behavior associations.

Adult age differences in risk perception and risk taking

Research on self-reported risk perception and risk taking suggests age-related decrements in risk preference, with older adults less likely to engage in general and domain-specific risk taking (i.e., in financial, health-related, ethical, career, and leisure contexts). Data relating to social risks, however, are inconsistent. With respect to behavioral risk-taking tasks, age-related differences vary depending on task characteristics and older adults' cognitive capacities. Specifically, older adults are less good at learning to take advantageous risks and take fewer risks when faced with gains, especially financial and mortality-based ones. We contextualize these trends by referencing relevant theoretical frameworks (see Frey et al., 2021 [1]) and by drawing on the COVID-19 pandemic to illustrate recent examples of age-related differences in real-life risk responses.

Age differences in the neural basis of decision-making under uncertainty

Humans globally are reaping the benefits of longer lives. Yet, longer life spans also require engaging with consequential but often uncertain decisions well into old age. Previous research has yielded mixed findings with regards to life span differences in how individuals make decisions under uncertainty. One factor contributing to the heterogeneity of findings is the diversity of paradigms that cover different aspects of uncertainty and tap into different cognitive and affective mechanisms. In this study, 175 participants (53.14% females, mean age = 44.9 years, SD = 19.0, age range = 16 to 81) completed functional neuroimaging versions of two prominent paradigms in this area, the Balloon Analogue Risk Task and the Delay Discounting Task. Guided by neurobiological accounts of age-related changes in decision-making under uncertainty, we examined age effects on neural activation differences in decision-relevant brain structures, and compared these across multiple contrasts for the two paradigms using specification curve analysis. In line with theoretical predictions, we find age differences in nucleus accumbens, anterior insula, and medial prefrontal cortex, but the results vary across paradigm and contrasts. Our results are in line with existing theories of age differences in decision making and their neural substrates, yet also suggest the need for a broader research agenda that considers how both individual and task characteristics determine the way humans deal with uncertainty.

Emotion, Aging, and Decision Making: A State of the Art Mini-Review

Over the past few decades, interest has begun to surge in understanding the role of emotion in decision making, and more recently in studies across the adult life span. Relevant to age-related changes in decision making, theoretical perspectives in judgment and decision making draw critical distinctions between deliberative versus intuitive/affective processes, as well as integral versus incidental affect. Empirical findings demonstrate the central role of affect in various decision-related domains such as framing and risk taking. To situate this review within an adult life-span context, we focus on theoretical perspectives in adult development regarding emotion and motivation. As a result of age differences in deliberative and emotional processes, taking a life-span perspective is critical to advance a comprehensive and grounded understanding of the role of affect in decision making. Age-related shifts in information processing from negative toward positive material also have consequential implications. By taking a life-span perspective, not only will decision theorists and researchers benefit, but so too will practitioners who encounter individuals of various ages as they make consequential decisions.

Puberty and risky decision-making in male adolescents

Pubertal development is a potential trigger for increases in risk-taking behaviours during adolescence. Here, we sought to investigate the relationship between puberty and neural activation during risky decision-making in males using functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI). Forty-seven males aged 12.5-14.5 years completed an fMRI risk-taking task (BART) and reported their tendencies for risky decision-making using a self-report questionnaire. Puberty was assessed through self-reported pubertal status and salivary testosterone levels. Testosterone concentration, but not physical pubertal status, was positively correlated with self-reported risk-taking behaviour, while neither was correlated with BART performance. Across the whole sample, participants had greater activation of the bilateral nucleus accumbens and right caudate on trials when they made a successful risky decision compared to trials when they made a safe choice or when their risky decision was unsuccessful. There was a negative correlation between pubertal stage and brain activation during unsuccessful risky decision-making trials compared within unsuccessful control trials. Males at a lower stage of pubertal development showed increased activation in the left insula, right cingulate cortex, dorsomedial prefrontal cortex (dmPFC), right putamen and right orbitofrontal cortex (OFC) relative to more pubertally mature males during trials when they chose to take a risk and the balloon popped compared to when they watched the computer make an unsuccessful risky decision. Less pubertally mature males also showed greater activation in brain regions including the dmPFC, right temporal and frontal cortices, right OFC, right hippocampus and occipital cortex in unsuccessful risky trials compared to successful risky trials. These results suggest a puberty-related shift in neural activation within key brain regions when processing outcomes of risky decisions, which may reduce their sensitivity to negative feedback, and in turn contribute to increases in adolescent risk-taking behaviours.

Relationship between virtual reality balloon analogue risk task and risky decision-making

The balloon analogue risk task (BART) is widely used to assess risk-taking tendencies on behavioral tests. However, biases or unstable results are sometimes reported, and there are concerns about whether the BART can predict risk behavior in the real world. To address this problem, the present study developed a virtual reality (VR) BART to enhance the reality of the task and narrow the gap between performance on the BART and risk behavior in the real world. We evaluated the usability of our VR BART through assessments of the relationships between BART scores and psychological metrics and additionally implemented an emergency decision-making VR driving task to investigate further whether the VR BART can predict risk-related decision-making in emergency situations. Notably, we found that the BART score significantly correlated with both sensation-seeking and risky driving behavior. Additionally, when we split participants into groups with high and low BART scores and compared their psychological metrics, we found that the high-score BART group included more male participants and exhibited higher sensation-seeking and more risky decision-making in an emergency situation. Overall, our study shows the potential of our new VR BART paradigm to predict risky decision-making in the real world.

Pay One or Pay All? The Role of Incentive Schemes in Decision Making Across Adulthood

OBJECTIVES

This research addresses how younger and older adults' decisions and evaluations of gains and losses are affected by the way in which monetary incentives are provided. We compared 2 common incentive schemes in decision making: pay one (only a single decision is incentivized) and pay all (incentives across all decisions are accumulated).

METHOD

Younger adults (18-36 years; n = 147) and older adults (60-89 years; n = 139) participated in either a pay-one or pay-all condition and made binary choices between two-outcome monetary lotteries in gain, loss, and mixed domains. We analyzed participants' decision quality, risk taking, and psychometric test scores. Computational modeling of cumulative prospect theory served to measure sensitivity to outcomes and probabilities, loss aversion, and choice sensitivity.

RESULTS

Decision quality and risk aversion were higher in the gain than mixed or loss domain, but unaffected by age. Loss aversion was higher, and choice sensitivity was lower in older than younger adults. In the pay-one condition, the value functions were more strongly curved, and choice sensitivity was higher than in the pay-all condition.

DISCUSSION

An opportunity of accumulating incentives has similar portfolio effects on younger and older adults' decisions. In general, people appear to decide less cautiously in pay-all than pay-one scenarios. The impact of different incentive schemes should be carefully considered in aging and decision research.

Decision Making across Adulthood during Physical Distancing

Covid-19-related social-distancing measures have dramatically limited physical social contact between individuals and increased monetary and health concerns for individuals of all ages. We wondered how these new societal conditions would impact the choices individuals make about monetary, health, and social rewards, and if these unprecedented conditions would have a differential impact on older individuals. We conducted two online studies to examine temporal discounting of monetary, health, and social rewards; stated preferences for monetary, health, and social rewards; and physical distancing behaviors. Both studies recruited equal numbers of White/Caucasian, Black/African American, and Hispanic/Latinx participants. We found that older adults were more likely to prefer smaller, sooner social and health-related rewards in decision-making tasks. These data further support the assertion that older adults have increased motivation for social and health rewards compared to younger individuals and that these age differences in motivation are important to consider when examining decision-making across the adult life span.

Effects of energy balance on cognitive performance, risk-taking, ambulatory vigilance and mood during simulated military sustained operations (SUSOPS)

Sustained operations (SUSOPS) require military personnel to conduct combat and training operations while experiencing physical and cognitive stress and limited sleep. These operations are often conducted in a state of negative energy balance and are associated with degraded cognitive performance and mood. Whether maintaining energy balance can mitigate these declines is unclear. This randomized crossover study assessed the effects of energy balance on cognitive performance, risk-taking propensity, ambulatory vigilance, and mood during a simulated 72-h SUSOPS.

METHODS

Ten male Soldiers (mean ± SE; 22.4 ± 1.7 y; body weight 87.3 ± 1.1 kg) completed two, 72-h simulated SUSOPS in random order, separated by 7 days of recovery. Each SUSOPS elicited ∼4500 kcal/d total energy expenditure and restricted sleep to 4 h/night. During SUSOPS, participants consumed either an energy-balanced or restricted diet that induced a 43 ± 3% energy deficit. A cognitive test battery was administered each morning and evening to assess: vigilance, working memory, grammatical reasoning, risk-taking propensity, and mood. Real-time ambulatory vigilance was assessed each morning, evening, and night via a wrist-worn monitoring device.

RESULTS

Participants exhibited heightened risk-taking propensity (p = 0.047) with lower self-reported self-control (p = 0.021) and fatigue (p = 0.013) during energy deficit compared to during energy balance. Vigilance accuracy (p < 0.001) and working memory (p = 0.040) performance decreased, and vigilance lapses increased (p < 0.001) during SUSOPS, but did not differ by diet. Percentage of correct responses to ambulatory vigilance stimuli varied during SUSOPS (p = 0.019) independent of diet, with generally poorer performance during the morning and night. Total mood disturbance (p = 0.001), fatigue (p < 0.001), tension (p = 0.003), and confusion (p = 0.036) increased whereas vigor decreased (p < 0.001) during SUSOPS, independent of diet.

CONCLUSION

Prolonged physical activity combined with sleep restriction is associated with impaired vigilance, memory, and mood state. Under such conditions, maintaining energy balance prevents increased risk-taking and improves self-control, but does not improve other aspects of cognitive function or mood. Given the small sample in the present study, replication in a larger cohort is warranted.

Positive and negative risk-taking: Age patterns and relations to domain-specific risk-taking

People take risks at all ages to achieve certain goals. Although these goals may be achieved through negative risks (e.g., adolescent drinking to impress their friends), people also take positive risks. Positive risks are theorized to help individuals achieve goals in developmentally appropriate and socially acceptable ways, such as initiating a new friendship as an adolescent, applying for a promotion as a young adult, or exploring a new hobby as a retiree. To test the hypothesis that people endorse different patterns of risk-taking across life, we examined age patterns in positive and negative risk-taking with a sample of individuals ranging in age from 12 to 71 years. In adults aged 19-71, we also examined to what extent positive and negative risk-taking are associated with domain-specific risk-taking and risk-taking propensity. Results indicated that positive risk-taking varied with age in the form of an inverted-U shape and peaked in middle adulthood. Negative antisocial risk-taking varied with age in the form of a U shape and was highest in adolescence. Negative health risk-taking varied with age in the form of an inverted-U shape and peaked in middle adulthood. In adults, greater positive risk-taking was associated with greater risk-taking in the social domain and greater risk-taking propensity. Greater negative risk-taking was associated with greater risk-taking in ethical and health/safety domains, and with greater risk-taking propensity. Altogether, this study is the first to demonstrate age patterns in positive and negative risk-taking across adolescence and adulthood. It also contributes to the validity of positive risk-taking as a construct distinct from negative risk-taking.

Associations between Early Psychosocial Deprivation, Cognitive and Psychiatric Morbidity, and Risk-taking Behavior in Adolescence

OBJECTIVE

Early psychosocial deprivation increases the risk of later cognitive and psychiatric problems, but not all deprived children show these difficulties. Here, we examine the extent to which psychosocial deprivation increases the risk of later cognitive and psychiatric difficulties and the downstream consequences of this for risk-taking behavior in adolescence.

METHOD

Children abandoned to institutions early in life were randomly assigned to care-as-usual or a foster care intervention during infancy. A separate group of never-institutionalized children was recruited as a comparison sample. The current follow-up study included 165 children (51% female), 113 with a history of institutionalization and 52 with no such history. At age 12, caregivers reported on children's psychiatric difficulties, and their IQ was assessed by standardized testing. At 16 years, risk-taking behavior was assessed from youth self-reports.

RESULTS

Latent profile analysis revealed three subgroups of children with varying levels of cognitive and psychiatric difficulties: Low-Morbidity (n = 104, 62.7%), Medium-Morbidity (n = 46, 27.9%), and High-Morbidity (n = 15, 9.4%). Nearly half of the institutionalized children belonged to the High- or Medium-Morbidity subgroups; and institutionally-reared children were significantly more likely to belong to one of these profiles than never-institutionalized children. Compared to the Low-Morbidity subgroup, membership in the Medium-Morbidity profile was associated with higher levels of risk-taking behavior at age 16 years.

CONCLUSIONS

Children who experience psychosocial deprivation are considerably more likely to present with elevated cognitive and psychiatric difficulties in early adolescence and, for some children, this elevation is linked to heightened risk-taking behavior in later adolescence.

Age and Framing Effects in the Balloon Analogue Risk Task (BART)

OBJECTIVES

Prior research has documented age differences in risky decisions and indicates that they are susceptible to gain versus loss framing. However, previous studies focused on 'decisions from description' that explicitly spell out the probabilities involved. The present study expands this literature by examining the effects of framing on age differences in the Balloon Analogue Risk Task (BART), a widely used and ecologically valid measure of experience-based risky decision-making that involves pumping a virtual balloon.

METHOD

In a pre-registered study, younger (aged 18-30, n =129) and older adults (aged 60 and over, n=125) were randomly assigned to either a gain version of the BART, where pumping the balloon added monetary gains, or a loss version, where pumping the balloon avoided monetary losses.

RESULTS

We found a significant age by frame interaction on risk-taking: in the loss frame, older adults pumped more frequently and experienced more popped balloons than younger adults, whereas in the gain frame no significant age differences were found. Total performance on the BART did not vary by age or frame. Supplementary analyses indicated that age differences in pumping rates were most pronounced at the beginning of the BART and leveled off in subsequent trials. Controlling for age differences in motivation, personality, and cognition did not account for age differences in risk-taking.

DISCUSSION

In combination, findings suggest that age differences in risk-taking on the BART are more pronounced when the task context emphasizes avoiding losses rather than achieving gains.

The influence of age and age simulation on task-difficulty choices in motor tasks

    Having a realistic perception of one's motor abilities is important for successful aging. We used two different motor tasks, carrying a tray with cube-towers (study 1; n = 20 young adults; n = 20 older adults), and stepping over a crossbar (study 2; n = 23 young adults; n = 21 older adults), to investigate how physical risk influences task-difficulty choices. We also investigated the effect of wearing an age simulation suit on young adults. For the tray-carrying task, older adults were more risk-tolerant in their task-difficulty choices. When stepping over the crossbar, older adults left a larger "safety-buffer" than young adults. When wearing the age suit, young adults adopted a more careful strategy in the stepping task. We conclude that healthy older adults flexibly adjust their strategies to postural risks, and that young adults' strategy-choices can be influenced by experimentally inducing some of the sensory-motor constraints of old age.

Identifying the contingencies of self-worth associated with eating disorder symptoms: The use of choice-based conjoint analysis

OBJECTIVE

Self-worth contingent on shape/weight is a diagnostic criterion and key maintaining factor for eating disorders. However, the role of other contingencies of self-worth (i.e., domains in which self-worth is invested) is largely unknown. Moreover, research has relied on self-ratings of contingency strength, which are subject to distortion through socially desirable responding and limited self-awareness, and may have limitations in terms of ecological validity. To overcome these limitations, the present study investigated a broad range of contingencies of self-worth in relation to eating disorder pathology and employed a choice-based conjoint (CBC) approach for assessing these contingencies.

METHOD

Young women and men from the community (N = 428) completed a CBC task to assess the domains in which self-worth is invested, the Eating Disorder Examination Questionnaire (EDE-Q) to assess eating disorder symptomatology, and the Balanced Inventory of Desirable Responding to assess socially desirable responding.

RESULTS

Beta regression analyses showed that CBC thinness and athletic competence predicted higher scores on all EDE-Q scales. CBC muscularity and facial attractiveness predicted higher scores, while coping ability and quality of relationships predicted lower scores, on various aspects of eating disorder symptoms. CBC social acceptance predicted lower eating disorder symptoms in males only.

DISCUSSION

The findings suggest that a broader range of contingencies of self-worth beyond shape/weight are relevant to eating disorder pathology and should be considered as potential underlying mechanisms and treatment targets. In addition, this first use of the CBC method in eating disorder research provides initial support for its validity and utility.

Imagining a Personalized Scenario Selectively Increases Perceived Risk of Viral Transmission for Older Adults

The COVID-19 pandemic has created a serious and prolonged public-health emergency. Older adults have been at substantially greater risk of hospitalization, ICU admission, and death due to COVID-19; as of February 2021, over 81% of COVID-19-related deaths in the U.S. occurred for people over the age of 65^1,2. Converging evidence from around the world suggests that age is the greatest risk factor for severe COVID-19 illness and for the experience of adverse health outcomes^3,4. Therefore, effectively communicating health-related risk information requires tailoring interventions to older adults' needs⁵. Using a novel informational intervention with a nationally-representative sample of 546 U.S. residents, we found that older adults reported increased perceived risk of COVID-19 transmission after imagining a personalized scenario with social consequences. Although older adults tended to forget numerical information over time, the personalized simulations elicited increases in perceived risk that persisted over a 1-3 week delay. Overall, our results bear broad implications for communicating information about health risks to older adults, and they suggest new strategies to combat annual influenza outbreaks.

Personal Values in Relation to Risk Intelligence: Evidence from a Multi-Mediation Model

In a risk society, personal values can be important resources, useful for managing uncertainty and guiding people in the perception of risk. The goal of this article is to explore the relationship between risk intelligence and personal values. The participants were 731 Italian adults aged between 18 and 65 years (M = 30.25; DS = 10.71). The survey was composed of the following measures: Subjective Risk Intelligence Scale and Portrait Values Questionnaire. Data analyses have found significant relationships between some types of personal values and risk intelligence: subjective risk intelligence is negatively related to conservation and positively related to openness to change and self-transcendence, but it was not related to self-enhancement. Furthermore, values of openness to change and self-transcendence mediate the relationship between age and subjective risk intelligence, while conservation values and self-enhancement values did not mediate the same relationship. Implication for practice and future research will be discussed.

Age Differences in Open-Mindedness: From 18 to 87-Years of Age

BACKGROUND

As health care improves and more people work into later age, it is important to understand what impacts open-mindedness has on decision-making. This paper examined the role of aging on open-mindedness.

METHODS

Open-mindedness was measured across 12 studies before data amalgamation. The Actively Open-minded Thinking (AOT) scale and Actively Open-minded Thinking about Evidence (AOT-e) scale measured open-mindedness in this sample (n = 9010) of participants between 18 and 87-years of age.

RESULTS

Summary AOT positively correlated with AOT-e (r = 0.27). For two subfactors derived from factor analysis based on the AOT, scores for both subfactors positively correlated with AOT-e (subfactor-1: r = 0.17/subfactor-2: r = 0.31) but negatively correlated with age (subfactor-1: r = -0.01/subfactor-2: r = -0.16). Age negatively correlated with both AOT (r = -0.11) and AOT-e (r = -0.13). Regressions revealed that open-mindedness decreased with aging. Age marginally predicted the change in open-mindedness, and sex differences were not a predictor.

CONCLUSION

It is proposed that the observed differences are the result of a reluctance to change long-established values and ideas at the cognitive level and cortical changes that occur with aging. In an aging population where more adults work into later age, the decrease in open-mindedness could influence many areas of judgments of decision-making. Importantly, this demonstrates that open-mindedness varies across lifespan.

Determinants of dental treatment avoidance: findings from a nationally representative study

BACKGROUND

Oral health care of older adults is of rising importance due to ongoing demographic changes. There is a lack of studies examining the determinants of dental treatment avoidance in this age group. Therefore, the objective of this study was to identify those determinants.

METHODS

Cross-sectional data were drawn from the second wave (year 2002) of the German Ageing Survey which is a population-based sample of community-dwelling individuals ≥ 40 years in Germany (n = 3398). Dental treatment avoidance was quantified using the question "Did you need dental treatments in the past twelve months, but did not go to the dentist?" [no; yes, once; yes, several times]. Socioeconomic and health-related determinants were adjusted for in the analysis. Multiple logistic regressions were performed.

RESULTS

In terms of need, 6.7% of individuals avoided dental treatment in the preceding twelve months. Multiple logistic regressions revealed that dental treatment avoidance was associated with younger age (total sample [OR 0.978; 95% CI 0.958-0.998] and men [OR 0.970; 95% CI 0.942-0.999]), unemployment (total sample [OR 1.544; 95% CI 1.035-2.302] and men [OR 2.004; 95% CI 1.085-3.702]), lower social strata (women [OR 0.814; 95% CI 0.678-0.977]), increased depressive symptoms (men [OR 1.031; 95% CI 1.001-1.062]), and increased physical illnesses (total sample [OR 1.091; 95% CI 1.006-1.183] and men [OR 1.165; 95% CI 1.048-1.295]). The outcome measure was not associated with income poverty, marital status and physical functioning.

CONCLUSIONS

The present study highlights the association between dental treatment avoidance and different socioeconomic and health-related factors. These results suggest that it is necessary to promote the importance of dental visits.

Age differences in risk taking: now you see them, now you don't

Older age has often, but not always, been associated with less risk taking. Inconsistencies may be due to diversity in the risk-taking measures used and/or individual differences in cognitive abilities. We investigated the robustness of age differences in risk taking across three measures, and tested whether age differences in risk taking remained after accounting for cognitive abilities. Younger (aged 25-36) and older (aged 60+) adults completed behavioral (i.e., Balloon Analogue Risk Task, BART) and self-report (i.e., framing tasks and Choice Dilemmas Questionnaire) measures of risk, as well as several measures of cognitive ability (i.e., analytic thinking, numeracy, processing speed, memory, and attention). Older adults showed significantly less risk taking than younger adults on the behavioral measure of risk, but not on the two self-report measures. Older adults also had significantly lower analytic thinking, slower processing speed, and worse executive control compared to younger adults. Less risk taking on the BART was associated with lower analytic thinking and numeracy, slower processing speed, and worse shifting of attention. Age differences in risk taking on the BART remained after accounting for older adults' lower scores on tests of cognitive abilities. Implications for measuring age differences in risk taking are discussed.

Executive Functions in Late Adolescence and Early Adulthood and Their Relationship with Risk-Taking Behavior

Executive functions (EF) continue developing throughout adolescence, with immaturity in EF theorized to underlie risk-taking. 129 older adolescents and young adults (aged 17 to 22 years) were assessed using a battery of cool and hot EF tasks, and a behavioral measure of risk-taking propensity. Minimal age-related differences in EF performance were evident, confirming they were largely functionally mature by mid-adolescence. Inconsistent with the predictions of imbalance models of adolescent development, weaker EF was not associated with greater risk-taking propensity. The findings suggest that during later adolescence and early adulthood, not all forms of risk-taking are associated with EF.

Brain-Behavior Associations for Risk Taking Depend on the Measures Used to Capture Individual Differences

Maladaptive risk taking can have severe individual and societal consequences; thus, individual differences are prominent targets for intervention and prevention. Although brain activation has been shown to be associated with individual differences in risk taking, the directionality of the reported brain-behavior associations is less clear. Here, we argue that one aspect contributing to the mixed results is the low convergence between risk-taking measures, especially between the behavioral tasks used to elicit neural functional markers. To address this question, we analyzed within-participant neuroimaging data for two widely used risk-taking tasks collected from the imaging subsample of the Basel-Berlin Risk Study (N = 116 young human adults). Focusing on core brain regions implicated in risk taking (nucleus accumbens, anterior insula, and anterior cingulate cortex), for the two tasks, we examined group-level activation for risky versus safe choices, as well as associations between local functional markers and various risk-related outcomes, including psychometrically derived risk preference factors. While we observed common group-level activation in the two tasks (notably increased nucleus accumbens activation), individual differences analyses support the idea that the presence and directionality of associations between brain activation and risk taking varies as a function of the risk-taking measures used to capture individual differences. Our results have methodological implications for the use of brain markers for intervention or prevention.

Problem Gambling Risk Among Older Francophones in Ontario Canada: Surprising Results that Contradict Previous Findings of Gambling in Minority Groups

Gambling is a popular activity among older adults. Despite this increase in popularity little research has examined gambling among this group. This is especially true for minority older adults, like Francophones in Ontario. The purpose of this study was to better understand gambling in a sample of older Francophones from North-Eastern Ontario, the first study to do so. A sample of 181 older (over 55 years) Francophones from Northeastern Ontario (M age = 68.7, SD 7.6) was recruited. This sample was compared to a sample of older adults with English as their native language that had been previously collected (Norris and Tindale in The meaning of gambling among Ontario seniors in small and rural communities, Final report to the Ontario Problem Gambling Research Centre, 2006; Tindale and Norris in Gambling among intergenerational and multi-ethnic families, Final report to the Ontario Problem Gambling Research Centre, 2012). In addition to demographic measures the participants filled out a questionnaire that included measures of gambling behaviours and attitudes the Windsor Screen, The Problem Gambling Severity Index of the Canadian Problem Gambling Inventory, The Center for Epidemiologic Studies Depression Scale and the CAGE Alcohol Screen. Contrary to expectations, the Francophone sample had lower scores on the problem gambling measures with a smaller proportion of the sample in the categories indicating a high risk for problem gambling. This surprising result might be due to the protective effect of a positive ethnolinguistic identity. However, more research will need to be done to better understand these unanticipated results. The findings of this study help us better understand gambling among older adults in a minority group.

The Age-related Neural Strategy Alterations in Decision Making Under Risk

Previous studies have shown that aging is associated with changes in decision behavior. However, the neural mechanisms that underpin such age differences are inadequately understood. In this study, we aim to characterize the optimal neural model underlying a dynamic decision making task in both young and older adults, and further examine the age differences from the perspective of effective connectivity. Twenty-five young and 23 older adults performed a dynamic risk taking task, i.e., the balloon analogue risk task, in the functional magnetic resonance imaging scanner. The dynamic causal modeling analysis, with the coupling between the ventromedial prefrontal cortex (VMPFC), dorsolateral prefrontal cortex (DLPFC) and anterior insula (AI) that were identified in our task-related activation and psychophysiological interaction analysis, was performed to address the best fitting neural model and characterize age differences. Although both age groups adopted the same optimal model with bidirectional connection between the VMPFC and DLPFC, older adults exhibited up-regulation in several connections and among which the increased modulatory effect of AI-to-VMPFC subserving their decision quality. Our finding suggests that older adults might utilize different neural strategy via compensation to counteract the impact of advanced age in risk taking process.

A Multi-method Investigation of the Personality Correlates of Functional Ability in Older Adults

OBJECTIVES

This study evaluated the role of personality in predicting functional ability (FA) in older adults using self-report, collateral report, and performance-based measures of FA.

METHODS

Participants included older adults (N = 131) who completed a personality measure (NEO-FFI), a self-report of FA (OARS ADL), and participated in a performance-based assessment of FA (DAFS-R). In addition, each participant had a collateral complete a collateral report of FA (OARS ADL). Bivariate correlations were computed to assess how Five Factor Model traits were related to self-report, collateral, and performance-based measures of FA.

RESULTS

Neuroticism was negatively related to self-reported FA (r = - .27) and collateral-reported FA (r = - .18) and Conscientiousness was positively related to self-reported FA (r = .25). None of the traits were significantly related to the performance-based measure of FA.

CONCLUSIONS

These results suggest that personality traits can impact self-reported FA in older adults and underscore the importance of assessing FA in older adults using multiple methods, particularly performance-based measures.

CLINICAL IMPLICATIONS

Clinicians should consider how personality may impact FA in older adults and multiple methods of FA performance should be examined to better tailor recommendations.

Age-related variability in decision-making: Insights from neurochemistry

Despite dopamine's significant role in models of value-based decision-making and findings demonstrating loss of dopamine function in aging, evidence of systematic changes in decision-making over the life span remains elusive. Previous studies attempting to resolve the neural basis of age-related alteration in decision-making have typically focused on physical age, which can be a poor proxy for age-related effects on neural systems. There is growing appreciation that aging has heterogeneous effects on distinct components of the dopamine system within subject in addition to substantial variability between subjects. We propose that some of the conflicting findings in age-related effects on decision-making may be reconciled if we can observe the underlying dopamine components within individuals. This can be achieved by incorporating in vivo imaging techniques including positron emission tomography (PET) and neuromelanin-sensitive MR. Further, we discuss how affective factors may contribute to individual differences in decision-making performance among older adults. Specifically, we propose that age-related shifts in affective attention ("positivity effect") can, in some cases, counteract the impact of altered dopamine function on specific decision-making processes, contributing to variability in findings. In an effort to provide clarity to the field and advance productive hypothesis testing, we propose ways in which in vivo dopamine imaging can be leveraged to disambiguate dopaminergic influences on decision-making, and suggest strategies for assessing individual differences in the contribution of affective attentional focus.

Don't Risk It. Older Adults Perceive Fewer Future Opportunities and Avoid Social Risk Taking

Drawing from life-span psychology, we conducted two studies to test perceptions of time left in the future as an underlying mechanism for age differences in self-reported social risk taking. Study 1 included 120 younger (25-35 years) and 119 older (60-91 years) community-dwelling adults. Study 2 included 439 participants (18-85 years) mostly recruited from Amazon Mechanical Turk. In both studies, older age was associated with rating a lower likelihood of social risk taking (e.g., speaking about an unpopular issue) and perceiving the future as holding fewer future opportunities and being more limited. Perceptions of fewer future opportunities with aging statistically mediated age-related declines in social risk taking. Findings highlight motivational factors as key for understanding age differences in social risk taking. Implications of age differences in social risk taking on factors related to well-being, such as social support and strain, are discussed.

Information use in risky decision making: Do age differences depend on affective context?

The current study focused on the degree to which decision context (deliberative vs. affective) differentially impacted the use of available information about uncertainty (i.e., probability, positive and negative outcome magnitudes, expected value, and variance/risk) when older adults were faced with decisions under risk. In addition, we examined whether individual differences in general mental ability and executive function moderated the associations between age and information use. Participants (N = 96) completed a neuropsychological assessment and the hot (affective) and cold (deliberative) versions of an explicit risk task. Our results did not find a significant Age × Hot/Cold Condition interaction on overall risk-taking. However, we found that older adults were less likely to use the full decision information available regardless of the decision context. This finding suggested more global age differences in information use. Moreover, older adults were less likely to make expected-value sensitive decisions, regardless of the hot/cold context. Finally, we found that low performance on measures of executive functioning, but not general mental ability, appears to be a risk factor for lower information use. This pattern appears in middle age and progressively becomes stronger in older age. The current work provides evidence that common underlying decision processes may operate in risk tasks deemed either affective or deliberative. It further suggests that underlying mechanisms such as information use may be paramount, relative to differences in the affective context. Additionally, individual differences in neuropsychological function may act as a moderator in the tendency to use available information across affective context. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2019 APA, all rights reserved).

Preferences and beliefs about financial risk taking mediate the association between anterior insula activation and self-reported real-life stock trading

People differ greatly in their financial risk taking behaviour. This heterogeneity has been associated with differences in brain activity, but only in laboratory settings using constrained behaviours. However, it is important to understand how these measures transfer to real life conditions, because the willingness to invest in riskier assets has a direct and considerable effect on long-term wealth accumulation. In a large fMRI study of 157 working age men (39.0 ± 6.4 SD years), we first show that activity in the anterior insula during the assessment of risky vs. safe choices in an investing task is associated with self-reported real-life active stock trading. We then show that this association remains intact when we control for financial constraints, education, the understanding of financial matters, and cognitive abilities. Finally, we use comprehensive measures of preferences and beliefs about risk taking to show that these two channels mediate the association between brain activation in the anterior insula and real-life active stock trading.

Comparing GPs' risk attitudes for their own health and for their patients' : a troubling discrepancy?

Background

In this paper, we report the results of risk attitudes elicitation of a French general practitioners national representative sample (N=1568).

Methods

Willingness to take risks in four different domains (daily life, financial matters, own health and patient health) was collected through a large-scale telephone interview of GPs using self-reported 11-point Likert scale questions.

Results

We uncover some specificities of the GPs population regarding their attitudes towards risk. In particular, we detect an important positive gap between their willingness to take risks in the domain of their own health and in the domain of the heath of their patients. This “patient-regarding” risk aversion is discussed with respect to its important consequences regarding medical behavior bias.

Conclusions

We confirm the self-other discrepancy found in the medical literature on physicians’ behaviors and emphasize the utility of the study and measures of personality traits such as “risk attitudes” for the medical professions and for the population they address.

Correlates of healthcare and financial decision making among older adults without dementia

OBJECTIVE

Healthcare and financial decision making among older persons has been previously associated with cognition, health and financial literacy, and risk aversion; however, the manner by which these resources support decision making remains unclear, as past studies have not systematically investigated the pathways linking these resources with decision making. In the current study, we use path analysis to examine the direct and indirect pathways linking age, education, cognition, literacy, and risk aversion with decision making. We also decomposed literacy into its subcomponents, conceptual knowledge and numeracy, in order to examine their associations with decision making.

METHOD

Participants were 937 community-based older adults without dementia from the Rush Memory and Aging Project who completed a battery of cognitive tests and assessments of healthcare and financial decision making, health and financial literacy, and risk aversion.

RESULTS

Age and education exerted effects on decision making, but nearly two thirds of their effects were indirect, working mostly through cognition and literacy. Cognition exerted a strong direct effect on decision making and a robust indirect effect working primarily through literacy. Literacy also exerted a powerful direct effect on decision making, as did its subcomponents, conceptual knowledge and numeracy. The direct effect of risk aversion was comparatively weak.

CONCLUSIONS

In addition to cognition, health and financial literacy emerged as independent and primary correlates of healthcare and financial decision making. These findings suggest specific actions that might be taken to optimize healthcare and financial decision making and, by extension, improve health and well-being in advanced age. (PsycINFO Database Record

Individual differences in risk-taking tendencies modulate the neural processing of risky and ambiguous decision-making in adolescence

Although many neuroimaging studies have investigated adolescent risk taking, few studies have dissociated between decision-making under risk (known probabilities) and ambiguity (unknown probabilities). Furthermore, which brain regions are sensitive to individual differences in task-related and self-reported risk taking remains elusive. We presented 198 adolescents (11-24 years, an age-range in which individual differences in risk taking are prominent) with an fMRI paradigm that separated decision-making (choosing to gamble or not) and reward outcome processing (gains, no gains) under risky and ambiguous conditions, and related this to task-related and self-reported risk taking. We observed distinct neural mechanisms underlying risky and ambiguous gambling, with risk more prominently associated with activation in parietal cortex, and ambiguity more prominently with dorsolateral prefrontal cortex (PFC), as well as medial PFC during outcome processing. Individual differences in task-related risk taking were positively associated with ventral striatum activation in the decision phase, specifically for risk, and negatively associated with insula and dorsomedial PFC activation, specifically for ambiguity. Moreover, dorsolateral PFC activation in the outcome phase seemed a prominent marker for individual differences in task-related risk taking under ambiguity as well as self-reported daily-life risk taking, in which greater risk taking was associated with reduced activation in dorsolateral PFC. Together, this study demonstrates the importance of considering multiple risk-taking measures, and contextual moderators, in understanding the neural mechanisms underlying adolescent risk taking.

Many face(t)s of young people’s risk-taking: Individual and situational determinants

Background

Adolescence and young adulthood are frequently characterised by a strong propensity to take risks. Yet, empirical data shows that personality traits, type and features of risk measures, or presence of additional incentives can significantly influence one’s risk-taking tendency. Our aim was to investigate young people’s risk-taking and point out when and how individual and situational factors may increase or decrease their risk-taking propensity.

Participants and procedure

Participants were adolescents and emerging adults (N = 173, age range: 13-30). Each completed two behavioural risk measures (“hot” and “cold” decision tasks) in two conditions, with or without financial incentives. Questionnaires assessing self-declared risk-taking, sensation seeking, and impulsivity were also used. Statistical analyses were conducted with gender and age as additional factors.

Results

In “hot” risk tasks all participants risked the same, while the tendency to take risks in “cold” tasks was higher for older participants, especially in the presence of incentives. Males risked more than females, apart from “hot” incentivised tasks where no gender differences were found. Sensation seeking and impulsivity were significant predictors of risk-taking in “hot” incentivised tasks, while performance in “cold” non-incentivised tasks depended on sensation seeking only.

Conclusions

Our results show that risk-taking is not a unitary phenomenon, and young people are not universal risk-takers. Certain personality traits seem to predispose this group to taking risks, but only in some circumstances (e.g. “hot” decisions). Factors such as task context or additional incentives can not only increase but also decrease risk-taking in young people, resulting in more caution on their behalf.

Aging and Decision-Making: A Conceptual Framework for Future Research - A Mini-Review

Age differences in decision-making are of theoretical interest and have important practical implications, but relevant lines of work are distributed across multiple disciplines and often lack integration. The present review proposes an overarching conceptual framework with the aim of connecting disjointed aspects of this field of research. The framework builds on process models of decision-making and specifies potential mechanisms behind age effects as well as relevant moderators including task characteristics and contextual factors. After summarizing the extant literature for each aspect of the framework, compensatory mechanisms and ecological fit between different components of the model are considered. Implications for real-life decision-making, remaining research gaps, and directions for future research are discussed.

Demographic challenges for the future business leader: evidence from a Greek survey

Purpose

The purpose of this paper is to identify the challenges posed to business leaders from major global demographic changes expected in the workforce composition, such as higher participation of women and more active involvement of elder and more experienced people in the future workforce.

Design/methodology/approach

The authors ran a survey among 733 middle managers, focusing on their ideal leadership behavior. The Global Leadership and Organizational Behavior project methodology was applied for data collection and analyses.

Findings

Several significant differences were established in leadership ideals according to gender, age and managerial experience. The differences based on gender had higher practical significance than the ones based on age and experience of the respondents.

Research limitations/implications

The paper adds up to the pertinent in the implicit leadership approach dialogue over the existence of stable, global and unchanging aspects of leadership.

Practical implications

Leader behaviors traditionally deemed as positive, such as the participative and charismatic/value-based leadership, are shown to be critical for the future business leader. Leadership development in organizations should focus on these two aspects.

Social implications

Leaders who can meet the expectations of diverse groups of people will be able to achieve inclusion of least privileged groups at the business level, leading to higher inclusion at the social, aggregate level.

Originality/value

The paper is the first to explore how documented demographic trends could affect the way that leadership will evolve in the near future.

Resting-State Functional Connectivity Within Medial Prefrontal Cortex Mediates Age Differences in Risk Taking

To investigate the association between age-related changes in risk taking and resting-state functional activity, we recorded resting-state scans from both young (n = 26) and older adults (n = 27). In addition, all participants completed two decision-making tasks: the Cambridge Gambling Task and the Balloon Analogue Risk Task. We found that older adults showed decreased functional connectivity within the medial prefrontal cortex, particularly between the ventromedial prefrontal cortex and the dorsal medial prefrontal cortex. Moreover, these changes in resting-state functional connectivity were associated with the individuals' risk-taking behavior, and mediated the influence of age on risk taking.