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Choice overload reduces neural signatures of choice set value in dorsal striatum and anterior cingulate cortex

Nature Human Behaviour volume 2, pages 925–935 (2018)Cite this article

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Abstract

Modern societies offer a large variety of choices1,2, which is generally thought to be valuable3,4,5,6,7. But having too much choice can be detrimental1,2,3,8,9,10,11 if the costs of choice outweigh its benefits due to ‘choice overload’12,13,14. Current explanatory models of choice overload mainly derive from behavioural studies13,14. A neuroscientific investigation could further inform these models by revealing the covert mental processes during decision-making. We explored choice overload using functional magnetic resonance imaging while subjects were either choosing from varying-sized choice sets or were browsing them. When choosing from sets of 6, 12 or 24 items, functional magnetic resonance imaging activity in the striatum and anterior cingulate cortex resembled an inverted U-shaped function of choice set size. Activity was highest for 12-item sets, which were perceived as having ‘the right amount’ of options and was lower for 6-item and 24-item sets, which were perceived as ‘too small’ and ‘too large’, respectively. Enhancing choice set value by adding a dominant option led to an overall increase of activity. When subjects were browsing, the decision costs were diminished and the inverted U-shaped activity patterns vanished. Activity in the striatum and anterior cingulate reflects choice set value and can serve as neural indicator of choice overload.

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Fig. 1: Choice set value.
Fig. 2: Experimental design.
Fig. 3: Behavioural performance.
Fig. 4: Brain areas reflecting choice set value.

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Data availability

The data that support the findings of this study as well as the data underlying our power calculations are available from the corresponding author upon reasonable request. Unthresholded statistical maps of our main fMRI-results are available at NeuroVault.org66 (https://neurovault.org/collections/4117/).

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Acknowledgements

The authors acknowledge support from the Spanish Ministry of Science and Education, grants nos. ECO2011-29865 (to E.R.), SEJ2005-08391 and ECO2008-01768 (to R.N.), the German Research Council (DFG CIN) (to A.L.), Generalitat de Catalunya, and BGSE (to R.N.), the Moore Foundation (to C.F.C. and R.A.A.), the Human Frontier Science Program (to C.F.C., R.N. and E.R.), the National Institutes of Health (Conte to C.F.C. and R.A.A.), the National Science Foundation and Boswell Foundation (to R.A.A), Caltech T&C Chen Social and Decision Neuroscience Center (to C.F.C.) and Caltech T&C Chen Brain–Machine Interface Center (to R.A.A.). The funders had no role in the conceptualization, design, data collection, analysis, decision to publish or preparation of the manuscript. The authors thank K. Quinn, A. Tank and A. Miro for help on previous versions of the manuscript.

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Author notes

  1. These authors contributed equally: Elena Reutskaja, Axel Lindner.

Authors and Affiliations

  1. Marketing Department, IESE Business School, Barcelona, Spain

    Elena Reutskaja

  2. Department of Psychiatry and Psychotherapy, University Hospital Tübingen, Tübingen, Germany

    Axel Lindner

  3. Department of Cognitive Neurology, Hertie-Institute for Clinical Brain Research, Tübingen, Germany

    Axel Lindner

  4. Division of Biology and Biological Engineering, California Institute of Technology, Pasadena, CA, USA

    Axel Lindner & Richard A. Andersen

  5. Institució Catalana de Recerca i Estudis Avançats, Barcelona Graduate School of Economics, Department of Economics and Business, Universitat Pompeu Fabra, Barcelona, Spain

    Rosemarie Nagel

  6. The Tianqiao and Chrissy Chen Brain-Machine Interface Center, California Institute of Technology, Pasadena, CA, USA

    Richard A. Andersen

  7. Division of the Humanities and Social Sciences and Computation and Neural Systems, California Institute of Technology, Pasadena, CA, USA

    Colin F. Camerer

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Contributions

Design was carried out by E.R., R.N., A.L., C.F.C. and R.A.A., fMRI collection by A.L. and E.R., fMRI analysis by A.L. and E.R. and other data analysis by E.R., A.L. and R.N. All authors contributed to writing the manuscript.

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Correspondence to Axel Lindner.

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Supplementary Information

Supplementary Discussion, Supplementary Methods, Supplementary References, Supplementary Figures 1–4, Supplementary Tables 1–2

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Supplementary Data 1

Multi-tab Excel spreadsheet listing all inference-stats values reported in the manuscript

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Reutskaja, E., Lindner, A., Nagel, R. et al. Choice overload reduces neural signatures of choice set value in dorsal striatum and anterior cingulate cortex. Nat Hum Behav 2, 925–935 (2018). https://doi.org/10.1038/s41562-018-0440-2

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