Effect of Individual’s Characteristics of Decision Making and Judgment on Stock-flow Performance

Extending the line of research on stock-flow performance we examined the impact of personality characteristics on task performance. It was assumed that the need for cognition, the need for closure and the preference for intuition and deliberation would relate to individual variations in task performance differentiated into the dimensions heuristic reasoning, task effectiveness (number of correct answers) and task efficiency (time needed to perform the task). It was found that the need for closure did not relate to any of the task performance dimensions, while the preference for deliberation related positively with task effectiveness, and the need for cognition positively with task effectiveness and negatively with heuristic reasoning. Although all three constructs possess a rather explicit temporal dimension, the examined needs and preferences appeared not te be correlated with the time needed to perform the stock-flow task. Further research is needed to elaborate on the precise relation between needs and preferences and stock-flow information processing as well as to refine the concept of task effectiveness. Introduction People have difficulties performing stock-flow tasks (Booth Sweeney & Sterman, 2000; Cronin, Gonzalez, & Sterman, 2009; Korzilius, Raaijmakers, Rouwette, & Vennix, 2011; Pala & Vennix, 2005; Sterman, 2010). However, research is scarce on how individual’s characteristics of decision-making and judgment relate to stock-flow task performance. The current study focuses on three individual characteristics: need for closure, the motivation connected with decision making and judgment (Kruglanski, 1989; Webster & Kruglanski, 1994), need for cognition, the extent to which a person enjoys and engages in effortful cognitive activities (Cacioppo, Petty, & Kao, 1984.), and individual strategy preference for intuition and deliberation (Betsch & Kunz, 2008; Kahneman, 2003). We explore the effect of the these three individual characteristics on task performance differentiated into heuristic reasoning (cf. Cronin et al.; Sterman), task effectiveness, and task efficiency.