1
Return

Early Life Stress Affects Human Decision Making by Increasing Expectations of Volatility

delete2026-06-17
delete0
delete
OA
AI
K
Karen E. Smith *
P
Payam Piray
A
Alyssa Teal
S
Selin Gok
S
Seth D. Pollak
DOI:10.1111/desc.70238delete
deleteOriginal
deleteOriginal request for help
deleteShare
deleteSave
Abstract

Abstract

En 中文
People learn most effectively when they can flexibly modify strategies to accommodate environmental changes. Here, we explore how chronic early life stress influences the ways individuals weight and prioritize new information when making decisions. To do so, we examined the choices of 11–16-year-old children in a reward learning task. Children varied on their level of stress exposure. We used a Bayesian computational learning model to assess whether differences in children's decision making were driven by difference in their expectations about the task environment. Children with high stress exposure switched their responses rather than maintaining choices that had previously been effective for them when making decisions about rewards. This switching was driven by children with high stress exposure expecting environments to be more volatile. These findings offer insight into how early life experiences can shape the subsequent parameters of human learning.
Keywords:
adversity
computational modeling
decision making
development
early life stress
learning

Journal

Developmental Science cover
Developmental Science
IF:
3.2
Papers:
2.9K
Citations:
9.5K

Organization

U
University of Wisconsin–Madison
Scholars:
732
Papers: 307
Citations: 0
R
rutgers university
Scholars:
1.2K
Papers: 696
Citations: 0
U
university of southern california
Scholars:
4.5W
Papers: 3.8W
Citations: 51
Cited Papers

Cited Papers

Citing Papers

Citing Papers