# Internally Formed Preferences for Options only Influence Initial Decisions in Gambling Tasks, while the Gambling Outcomes do not Alter these Preferences

## TL;DR

This study shows that personal preferences influence initial gambling decisions but are not changed by the outcomes of those decisions.

## Contribution

The study reveals that internal preferences impact initial choices in gambling but remain unaffected by external outcomes.

## Key findings

- Strong internal preferences influence initial choices in externally guided gambling tasks.
- Gambling outcomes do not alter previously formed internal preferences.
- Subjective preference evaluations show internal preferences are maintained despite external outcomes.

## Abstract

All humans must engage in decision-making. Decision-making processes can be broadly classified into internally guided decision-making (IDM), which is determined by individuals’ internal value criteria, such as preference, or externally guided decision-making (EDM), which is determined by environmental external value criteria, such as monetary rewards. However, real-life decisions are never made simply using one kind of decision-making, and the relationship between IDM and EDM remains unclear. This study had individuals perform gambling tasks requiring the EDM using stimuli that formed preferences through the preference judgment task as the IDM. Computational model analysis revealed that strong preferences in the IDM affected initial choice behavior in the EDM. Moreover, through the analysis of the subjective preference evaluation after the gambling tasks, we found that even when stimuli that were preferred in the IDM were perceived as less valuable in the EDM, the preference for IDM was maintained after EDM. These results indicate that although internal criteria, such as preferences, influence EDM, the results show that internal and external criteria differ.

The online version contains supplementary material available at 10.1007/s10899-024-10326-2.