Axiomatizing bounded rationality: the priority heuristic

This paper presents an axiomatic framework for the priority heuristic, a model of bounded rationality in Selten’s (in: Gigerenzer and Selten (eds.) Bounded rationality: the adaptive toolbox, 2001) spirit of using empirical evidence on heuristics. The priority heuristic predicts actual human choices between risky gambles well. It implies violations of expected utility theory such as common consequence effects, common ratio effects, the fourfold pattern of risk taking and the reflection effect. We present an axiomatization of a parameterized version of the heuristic which generalizes the heuristic in order to account for individual differences and inconsistencies. The axiomatization uses semiorders (Luce, Econometrica 24:178–191, 1956), which have an intransitive indifference part and a transitive strict preference component. The axiomatization suggests new testable predictions of the priority heuristic and makes it easier for theorists to study the relation between heuristics and other axiomatic theories such as cumulative prospect theory.     

Leisure Time in Modern Societies: A New Source of Boredom and Stress?

The increase in leisure time over the last century is well documented. We know much less, however, about the quality of the use of leisure time. Quite divergent predictions exist in this regard: Some authors have argued that the new, extensive free time will lead to new forms of time pressure and stress; others have foreseen an expansion of boredom. This is the first paper that systematically investigates the quality of leisure time in 36 countries around the world. It uses the 2007 ISSP-survey “Leisure Time and Sport”. We investigate stress and boredom during leisure time by making use of four general theories about international and intercultural differences. The theories relate to the level of socio-economic development, religious–cultural systems, types of welfare states, and to the emergence of specific “time regimes”. In addition, we control for the effect of relevant individual level variables. At the macro level, significant differences emerge concerning the level of development, the dominant religion, and the extent of welfare benefits. The most interesting finding, however, was that a typology of leisure time regimes is the most suited to explain the considerable differences between the 36 countries compared. Implications of this finding for time policy and further research are discussed in the concluding section.     

Religiosity,quality of life,and survival in cancer patients

This study is based on a sample of 253 hospitalised cancer patients who filled out a 108 item-questionnaire, including indicators of quality of life and a two-item religiosity scale. A majority of the patients reported that their religious belief had been of support to them after they became ill from cancer. Religiosity was found to be significantly related to general satisfaction with life and feelings of hopelessness. A Cox regression analysis, where religiosity was entered among other relevant covariates, showed a negative relationship between religiosity and the hazard rate that came very close to attain statistical significance. Thus, the effect of religiosity on the survival of patients with severe diseases such as cancer seems worth following up in future studies.     

Lawler’s minmax cost problem under uncertainty

The well-known \(O(n^2)\) minmax cost algorithm of Lawler (Manag Sci 19(5):544–546, 1973) was developed to minimize the maximum cost of jobs processed by a single machine under precedence constraints. We first develop a fast updating algorithm to obtain optimal solutions for two neighboring instances. This method will be used throughout this article. Then we consider job cost functions that depend on the completion time and on one or more additional numerical parameters. The parameters are uncertain and take values from given intervals. Under the uncertainty, we apply the minmax regret criterion for choosing a solution. We generalize results by Brauner et al. (J Sched, 2015) for decomposable cost functions with deterministic processing times and a single uncertain parameter to general cost functions. We describe different conditions, under which minmax regret solutions can be obtained with the time complexity \(O(n^3)\) or \(O(n^2)\). Then the updating algorithm is applied to the lateness model by Kasperski (Oper Res Lett 33:431–436, 2005) where both the processing time and the due date of each job are uncertain. The original \(O(n^4)\) running time is improved to the time complexity \(O(n^3)\). Finally, we extend the cost functions with a single uncertain parameter to those with a vector of additional uncertain parameters, improve one of the complexity results by Volgenant and Duin (Comput Oper Res 37:909–915, 2010) and solve some new problems.     

Nondegenerate Intervals of No-Trade Prices for Risk Averse Traders

According to the local risk-neutrality theorem an agent who has the opportunity to invest in an uncertain asset does not buy it or sell it short iff its expected value is equal to its price, independently of the agent's attitude towards risk. Contrary to that it is shown that, in the context of expected utility theory with differentiable vNM utility function, but without the assumption of stochastic constant returns to scale, nondegenerate intervals of no-trade prices may exist. With a quasiconcave expected utility function they do if, and only if, the agent is risk averse of order one.     

Editorial

Ohne Zusammenfassung