The motivated memory of noise - HAL-SHS - Sciences de l'Homme et de la Société
Pré-Publication, Document De Travail Année : 2024

The motivated memory of noise

Résumé

We propose a two-stage experiment in which people receive feedback about their relative intelligence. This feedback is a noisy message reminded at every stage, so that subjects cannot forget this ego-relevant information. Instead, we exogenously vary whether the informativeness of the message is reminded in the second stage. We investigate how this treatment variation affects the informativeness reported by subjects, and their posterior beliefs about their intelligence. We show that subjects report informativeness in a self-serving way: subjects with negative messages report that these messages are significantly less informative in the absence of reminder than with it. We also show that the lack of reminder about message informativeness allows subjects to keep a better image of themselves. These results are confirmed by complementary treatments in which we decrease messages informativeness: subjects tend to inflate the informativeness of positive messages that should now be interpreted as bad news.
Fichier principal
Vignette du fichier
24010.pdf (950.72 Ko) Télécharger le fichier
Origine Fichiers produits par l'(les) auteur(s)
Licence

Dates et versions

halshs-04744490 , version 1 (18-10-2024)

Licence

Identifiants

  • HAL Id : halshs-04744490 , version 1

Citer

Jeanne Hagenbach, Nicolas Jacquemet, Philipp Sternal. The motivated memory of noise. 2024. ⟨halshs-04744490⟩
0 Consultations
0 Téléchargements

Partager

More