Human and pigeon suboptimal choice

Many studies have shown that pigeons will sometimes behave suboptimally by choosing an option that provides food less frequently over one that provides food more frequently. The critical factor in driving suboptimal behavior in these procedures is that the delayed outcomes are differentially signaled on the suboptimal alternative, but not the optimal alternative. Although this procedure is frequently cited as potentially analogous to human gambling, there is little empirical data to evaluate this assertion. The present study tested both pigeon (Experiment 1) and human (Experiment 2) subjects with a suboptimal choice task. Subjects chose between a suboptimal alternative that provided a large reinforcer 20% of the time and an optimal alternative that always provided a small reinforcer. Stimuli presented during the delays signaled the outcomes on the suboptimal alternative in some conditions. When outcomes were signaled, pigeons chose the suboptimal alternative more frequently than did humans. When the outcomes were not signaled, pigeons’ choices became more optimal, but humans’ choices did not. Humans’ suboptimal choice was unrelated to performance on a probability discounting task. Overall, these findings suggest that although both pigeons and humans can choose suboptimally, more research is needed in order to determine whether non-human performance on this task can serve as a model for human gambling.