Validation of a novel effort‐discounting assessment and evaluation of the effort‐delay confound on effort discounting
Control delay in effort-discount tasks or you will overestimate how much effort alone devalues rewards.
01Research in Context
What this study did
Peck et al. (2024) built a new computer task that measures how much effort lowers the value of a reward. They ran a randomized trial to check if the task really captures effort discounting. They also tested what happens when a short delay is mixed in with the effort requirement.
The goal was to see if older studies that did not control delay gave inflated effort-discount numbers.
What they found
The new task worked. It cleanly tracked how hard work made rewards less appealing. When a small delay was added, people acted as if the work was even harder. That means past data that let delay slip in probably overestimated how much effort alone turns people off.
How this fits with other research
Cullinan et al. (2001) ran an earlier lab task that treated effort as just one of four reinforcer dimensions. Peck et al. keep the lab format but isolate effort and lock out delay, tightening the measurement.
White et al. (2021) reviewed preference displacement studies and warned that method choices can flip outcomes. Peck et al. echo that warning with fresh data: uncontrolled delay is one of those sneaky method choices.
Sievers et al. (2020) showed that longer access to leisure items stopped edibles from falsely topping the list. Peck et al. run the same play in a different arena: control the extra variable (delay) to keep the measure honest.
Why it matters
If you use effort-based preference assessments, borrow the clean format from Peck et al. Strip out any built-in wait time. You will get a truer picture of how effort affects your client’s choices, and you will avoid picking tasks that look too hard only because a hidden delay is doing the damage.
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02At a glance
03Original abstract
A vast literature highlights the prevalence of impulsive decision making in maladaptive outcomes. Most research has focused on one form-delay discounting. Less research has focused on effort discounting, possibly because of a lack of a standardized task for assessment. In published effort-discounting tasks, effort is conceptualized in many ways, making it difficult to compare findings across studies. Additionally, most effort-discounting tasks do not control for the time inherent in completing the effortful task, which makes it difficult to disentangle effort discounting from delay discounting. The current study evaluated the validity of a novel hypothetical effort-discounting task. The novel task was used to evaluate the influence of the effort-delay confound on rates of effort discounting in humans. Participants were randomly assigned to complete a confounded or a controlled version of the novel effort-discounting task. The effort-discounting data were well described by hyperbolic and exponential functions. When effort and delay were confounded, effort-discounting rates were significantly higher than when effort alone influenced discounting. The results suggest that data that are produced by effort-discounting tasks that do not control the effort-delay confound should be interpreted cautiously because they are also influenced by delay discounting. Task limitations and future directions are discussed.
Journal of the Experimental Analysis of Behavior, 2024 · doi:10.1002/jeab.4214