[null, {"document_url": "http://www.psy.unsw.edu.au/Decision_Making_Big_and_Small", "unformatted_src": "http://www.psy.unsw.edu.au/sites/all/files/page_image/decision%20making.jpg", "src": "http://www.psy.unsw.edu.au/sites/all/files/page_image/decision%20making.jpg", "formatted_filename": "decision making", "rendered_width": 300, "rendered_height": 350}, null]

Decision Making: Big and Small - Dr Chris Donkin

What is this research about?

We are constantly making decisions. These decisions range from being large –which phone to buy next, to incredibly small – the colour of the upcoming traffic light. We are interested in trying to understand how such decisions are made, both big and small. For example, how do we combine all of the relevant (and irrelevant) pieces of information when choosing which new phone is best? What happens when we are forced to make such decisions quickly? Other researchers involved:

Professor Ben Newell
Associate Professor Daniel Navarro
Arthur Kary

Publications relating to this research:

Van Ravenzwaaij, D., Donkin, C., & Vandekerckhove, J. (2017). The EZ diffusion model provides a powerful test of simple empirical effects. Psychonomic Bulletin & Review.

Cassey, P., Hawkins, G., Donkin, C., & Brown, S. D. (2016) Using alien coins to test whether simple inference is Bayesian. Journal of Experimental Psychology: Learning, Memory & Cognition, 42, 497-503.

Donkin, C., Newell, B. R., Kalish, M., Dunn, J. C., & Nosofsky, R. M. (2015). Identifying strategy use in category learning tasks: A case for more diagnostic data and models. Journal of Experimental Psychology: Learning, Memory & Cognition, 41, 933-948.

Rae, B., Heathcote, A., Donkin, C., Averell, L., & Brown, S. D. (2014). The hare and the tortoise: Emphasizing speed can change the evidence used to make decisions. Journal of Experimental Psychology: Learning, Memory and Cognition, 40, 1226-1243.

Grants awarded:

2016-2018 ARC Discovery Project. “Unifying decisions from experience and description”. Cis: B. R. Newell, C. Donkin.

2013-2015 ARC Discovery Project. “A new approach to understanding decision making” CI: C. Donkin, S. D. Brown, PI: G. Logan.


To find out more about this research, please contact Dr Chris Donkin.

Student Resources

Psychology Links

Research Tools

UNSW Links