Optimistic update bias holds firm: Three tests of robustness following Shah et al

Depressive symptoms and the processing of unexpected social feedback: Differences in surprise levels, feedback acceptance, and "immunizing" cognition

Negative social expectations are a key symptom of depression. It has been suggested that individuals with depressive symptoms tend to maintain these expectations by devaluing new experiences that do not fit prior expectations. However, our understanding of the role of such "immunizing" cognition in response to unexpected social feedback in depression, as well as the cognitive mechanisms involved, remains limited. This study investigated the association between depressive symptoms and the cognitive processing of unexpected positive or negative social feedback using a novel, video-based approach featuring naturalistic social stimuli in a subclinical online sample (N = 155). We also examined how surprise levels, feedback acceptance and immunizing cognition relate to other cognitive processes, such as attributional style and rumination, using cross-sectional network analyses. Robust multiple linear regression analyses revealed that depressive symptoms were associated with higher surprise levels (R2adj. = .27), lower feedback acceptance (R2adj. = .19), and higher levels of immunizing cognition (R2adj. = .09) in response to unexpected positive social feedback, but only partially to unexpected negative social feedback. The network analysis suggested that self-efficacy expectations for coping with negative feelings and acceptance of positive social feedback had the strongest expected influence on the different cognitive processes. Our study highlights the challenges that individuals with depressive symptoms face in utilizing positive social feedback to modify negative expectations. For clinicians, our findings suggest the importance of promoting acceptance of positive social feedback, while simultaneously inhibiting immunizing cognition and avoiding the use of overly positive feedback.

The Universal Optimism of the Self-Evidencing Mind

Karl Friston's free-energy principle casts agents as self-evidencing through active inference. This implies that decision-making, planning and information-seeking are, in a generic sense, 'wishful'. We take an interdisciplinary perspective on this perplexing aspect of the free-energy principle and unpack the epistemological implications of wishful thinking under the free-energy principle. We use this epistemic framing to discuss the emergence of biases for self-evidencing agents. In particular, we argue that this elucidates an optimism bias as a foundational tenet of self-evidencing. We allude to a historical precursor to some of these themes, interestingly found in Machiavelli's oeuvre, to contextualise the universal optimism of the free-energy principle.

Preexposure to one social threat alters responses to another social threat: Behavioral and electrophysiological evidence

A recent Cyberball study has indicated that the experience of loss of control can affect how people process subsequent social exclusion. This "preexposure effect" supports the idea of a common cognitive system involved in the processing of different types of social threats. To test the validity of this assumption in the current study, we reversed the sequence of the preexposure setup. We measured the effects of social exclusion on the subsequent processing of loss of control utilizing event-related brain potentials (ERPs) and self-reports. In the control group (CG, n = 26), the transition to loss of control elicited significant increases in both the P3 amplitude and the self-reported negative mood. Replicating the results of the previous preexposure study, these effects were significantly reduced by the preexposure to an independent social threat (here: social exclusion). In contrast to previous findings, these effects were not modulated by the discontinuation (EG1disc, n = 25) or continuation (EG2cont, n = 24) of the preexposure threat. Given that the P3 effect is related to the violation of subjective expectations, these results support the notion that preexposure to a specific social threat has widespread effects on the individuals' expectancy of upcoming social participation and control.

Neural correlates of valence-dependent belief and value updating during uncertainty reduction: An fNIRS study

Selective use of new information is crucial for adaptive decision-making. Combining a gamble bidding task with assessing cortical responses using functional near-infrared spectroscopy (fNIRS), we investigated potential effects of information valence on behavioral and neural processes of belief and value updating during uncertainty reduction in young adults. By modeling changes in the participants' expressed subjective values using a Bayesian model, we dissociated processes of (i) updating beliefs about statistical properties of the gamble, (ii) updating values of a gamble based on new information about its winning probabilities, as well as (iii) expectancy violation. The results showed that participants used new information to update their beliefs and values about the gambles in a quasi-optimal manner, as reflected in the selective updating only in situations with reducible uncertainty. Furthermore, their updating was valence-dependent: information indicating an increase in winning probability was underweighted, whereas information about a decrease in winning probability was updated in good agreement with predictions of the Bayesian decision theory. Results of model-based and moderation analyses showed that this valence-dependent asymmetry was associated with a distinct contribution of expectancy violation, besides belief updating, to value updating after experiencing new positive information regarding winning probabilities. In line with the behavioral results, we replicated previous findings showing involvements of frontoparietal brain regions in the different components of updating. Furthermore, this study provided novel results suggesting a valence-dependent recruitment of brain regions. Individuals with stronger oxyhemoglobin responses during value updating was more in line with predictions of the Bayesian model while integrating new information that indicates an increase in winning probability. Taken together, this study provides first results showing expectancy violation as a contributing factor to sub-optimal valence-dependent updating during uncertainty reduction and suggests limitations of normative Bayesian decision theory.

Factors influencing the update of beliefs regarding controversial political issues

Selectively integrating new information contributes to belief polarization and compromises public discourse. To better understand factors that underlie biased belief updating, I conducted three pre-registered studies covering different controversial political issues. The main hypothesis was that cognitively devaluing new information hinders belief updating. Support for this hypothesis was found in only one of the three issues. The only factor that consistently influenced belief updating across issues was the discrepancy between prior beliefs and new information. These results suggest that usually people do use evidence to correct their beliefs, but may refuse to do so if doubts about its generalizability arise.

There is no belief update bias for neutral events: failure to replicate Burton et al. (2022)

In a recent paper, Burton et al. claim that individuals update beliefs to a greater extent when learning an event is less likely compared to more likely than expected. Here, we investigate Burton's et al.'s, findings. First, we show how Burton et al.'s data do not in fact support a belief update bias for neutral events. Next, in an attempt to replicate their findings, we collect a new data set employing the original belief update task design, but with neutral events. A belief update bias for neutral events is not observed. Finally, we highlight the statistical errors and confounds in Burton et al.'s design and analysis. This includes mis-specifying a reinforcement learning approach to model the data and failing to follow standard computational model fitting sanity checks such as parameter recovery, model comparison and out of sample prediction. Together, the results find little evidence for biased updating for neutral events.

The shadowing effect of initial expectation on learning asymmetry

Evidence for positivity and optimism bias abounds in high-level belief updates. However, no consensus has been reached regarding whether learning asymmetries exist in more elementary forms of updates such as reinforcement learning (RL). In RL, the learning asymmetry concerns the sensitivity difference in incorporating positive and negative prediction errors (PE) into value estimation, namely the asymmetry of learning rates associated with positive and negative PEs. Although RL has been established as a canonical framework in characterizing interactions between agent and environment, the direction of learning asymmetry remains controversial. Here, we propose that part of the controversy stems from the fact that people may have different value expectations before entering the learning environment. Such a default value expectation influences how PEs are calculated and consequently biases subjects' choices. We test this hypothesis in two learning experiments with stable or varying reinforcement probabilities, across monetary gains, losses, and gain-loss mixed environments. Our results consistently support the model incorporating both asymmetric learning rates and the initial value expectation, highlighting the role of initial expectation in value updating and choice preference. Further simulation and model parameter recovery analyses confirm the unique contribution of initial value expectation in accessing learning rate asymmetry.

Biased belief updating in depression

Cognitive approaches to depression have benefitted from recent research on belief updating, examining how new information is used to alter beliefs. This review presents recent advances in understanding various sources of bias in belief updating in depression. Specifically, research has demonstrated that people with depression have difficulty revising negative beliefs in response to novel positive information, whereas belief updating in depression is not related to an enhanced integration of negative information. In terms of mechanisms underlying the deficient processing of positive information, research has shown that people with depression use defensive cognitive strategies to devalue novel positive information. Furthermore, the disregard of novel positive information can be amplified by the presence of state negative affect, and the resulting persistence of negative beliefs in turn perpetuates chronically low mood, contributing to a self-reinforcing negative feedback loop of beliefs and affect. Synthesising previous research, this review proposes a coherent framework of when belief change is likely to occur, and argues that future research also needs to elucidate why people with depression hesitate to abandon negative beliefs. Recent insights from belief updating have not only improved the understanding of the psychopathology of depression, but also have the potential to improve its cognitive-behavioural treatment.

Expectations do not need to be accurate to be maintained: Valence and need for cognitive closure predict expectation update vs. persistence

Expectations about us and our environment serve to successfully anticipate the future, make accurate predictions, and guide behavior and decisions. However, when expectations are not accurate, individuals need to resolve or minimize incongruence. Coping is especially important when expectations affect important domains such as students' academic self-concept. Whether expectations are adjusted after expectation violation (accommodation), maintained by denying the discrepancy (immunization), or whether individuals modify behavior to minimize the likelihood of future expectation violations (assimilation) depends on situational and dispositional predictors. In our experiment, we examined valence of expectation violation (positive vs. negative) as a situational predictor together with need for cognitive closure (NCC) as a dispositional predictor with N = 297 participants in a word riddle study. MANCOVA revealed that students tended to assimilate and accommodate more strongly after worse-than-expected achievement, and also NCC promoted both stronger accommodation and assimilation. NCC interacted with the valence of expectation violation: individuals with high NCC reported more assimilation and accommodation only after worse-than-expected achievement. The results replicate and extend previous findings: individuals do not always strive to have the most accurate expectations possible. Instead, both affective (valence) and cognitive (NCC) predictors appear to affect which coping strategy is preferred by the individual.

Brain Systems Underlying Fundamental Motivations of Human Social Conformity

From birth to adulthood, we often align our behaviors, attitudes, and opinions with a majority, a phenomenon known as social conformity. A seminal framework has proposed that conformity behaviors are mainly driven by three fundamental motives: a desire to gain more information to be accurate, to obtain social approval from others, and to maintain a favorable self-concept. Despite extensive interest in neuroimaging investigation of social conformity, the relationship between brain systems and these fundamental motivations has yet to be established. Here, we reviewed brain imaging findings of social conformity with a componential framework, aiming to reveal the neuropsychological substrates underlying different conformity motivations. First, information-seeking engages the evaluation of social information, information integration, and modification of task-related activity, corresponding to brain networks implicated in reward, cognitive control, and tasks at hand. Second, social acceptance involves the anticipation of social acceptance or rejection and mental state attribution, mediated by networks of reward, punishment, and mentalizing. Third, self-enhancement entails the excessive representation of positive self-related information and suppression of negative self-related information, ingroup favoritism and/or outgroup derogation, and elaborated mentalizing processes to the ingroup, supported by brain systems of reward, punishment, and mentalizing. Therefore, recent brain imaging studies have provided important insights into the fundamental motivations of social conformity in terms of component processes and brain mechanisms.

Asymmetrical friendships? People are willing to risk COVID-19 infection from friends but are reluctant to pass it on to them

Although most protective behaviors related to the COVID-19 pandemic come with personal costs, they will produce the largest benefit if everybody cooperates. This study explores two interacting factors that drive cooperation in this tension between private and collective interests. A preregistered experiment (N = 299) examined (a) how the quality of the relation among interacting partners (social proximity), and (b) how focusing on the risk of self-infection versus onward transmission affected intentions to engage in protective behaviors. The results suggested that risk focus was an important moderator of the relation between social proximity and protection intentions. Specifically, participants were more willing to accept the risk of self-infection from close others than from strangers, resulting in less caution toward a friend than toward a distant other. However, when onward transmission was the primary concern, participants were more reluctant to effect transmission to close others, resulting in more caution toward friends than strangers. These findings inform the debate about effective nonclinical measures against the pandemic. Practical implications for risk communication are discussed.

From Loss of Control to Social Exclusion: ERP Effects of Preexposure to a Social Threat in the Cyberball Paradigm

Previous studies indicated that the onsets of different social threats, such as threats to ”belonging” and “control”, are inconsistent with the subjective beliefs of social participation and require readjustment of expectations. Because a common cognitive system is assumed to be involved, the adjustment triggered by the experience of a single social threat should affect the processing of subsequent social interactions. We examined how preexposure to a loss of control affected social exclusion processing by using the Cyberball paradigm. An event-related brain component (P3) served as a probe for the state of the expectancy system, and self-reports reflected the subjective evaluations of the social threats. In the control group (n = 23), the transition to exclusion elicited a significant P3 effect and a high threat to belonging in the self-reports. Both effects were significantly reduced when the exclusion was preceded by preexposure to a loss of control (EG1_disc, n = 23). These effects, however, depend on the offset of the preexposure. In case of a continuation (EG2_cont, n = 24), the P3 effect was further reduced, but the threat to belonging was restored. We conclude that the P3 data are consistent with predictions of a common expectancy violation account, whereas self-reports are supposed to be affected by additional processes.

Predictors of Coping with Health-related Expectation Violations among University Students

Objectives: Individuals often experience expectation violations related to the consumption of healthy food and physical activity and they may cope with expectation-disconfirming information by (1) ignoring the discrepancy (immunization), (2) increasing efforts to fulfill them (assimilation), or (3) changing their expectations (accommodation). We investigated whether valence, discrepancy magnitude, and controllability of the expectation disconfirming event predicted coping with expectation violations. Methods: A 2 (valence: positive vs negative) x 2 (discrepancy: larger vs smaller) x 2 (controllability: control vs no control) experimental design was implemented. Overall, we presented 297 university students with vignettes describing expectation violations and present different combinations of predictor levels. Results: Regarding physical activity, participants showed significantly higher accommodation when experiencing a better-than-expected event and showed significantly higher immunization when experiencing a worse-than-expected event. Regarding food consumption and physical activity, individuals experiencing lower discrepancy showed significantly higher immunization; individuals with control over the source of expectation disconfirmation showed significantly higher assimilation; and individuals without control over the source of expectation disconfirmation showed significantly higher accommodation.Conclusions: To promote the maintenance of healthy expectations, despite expectation violations, interventions could foster the perception of control as well as assimilative behavior.

Negative belief-updating bias for positive daily life events in individuals with schizophrenia and social anhedonia

INTRODUCTION

Low-pleasure beliefs are found in both patients with schizophrenia (SZ) and individuals with high social anhedonia (SocAnh), and are associated with anhedonia. However, little is known about the development and maintenance of these low-pleasure beliefs in the clinical and subclinical populations. We investigated whether patients with SZ and individuals with high SocAnh have deficits in updating their beliefs, which may contribute to the understanding of the formation and maintenance of low-pleasure beliefs.

METHODS

The Modified Belief Updating Task was administered to assess belief-updating patterns in a clinical sample (36 SZ patients and 30 matched controls) and a subclinical sample (27 individuals with high SocAnh and 30 matched controls).

RESULTS

We found that compared with controls, SZ patients updated their beliefs to a greater extent and more frequently when receiving bad news for positive life events, but not for negative life events. Moreover, individuals with high SocAnh also exhibited similar patterns in updating their beliefs for positive life events after controlling depressive symptoms.

CONCLUSIONS

Our findings suggest that negative belief-updating patterns for positive events may play an important role in the formation and maintenance of low-pleasure beliefs in patients with SZ and individuals with high SocAnh.

Evolutionary game analysis of opportunistic behavior of Sponge City PPP projects: a perceived value perspective

Sponge City Public Private Partnership (PPP) project is a significant step to promote the construction of resilient city and sustainable development. Private companies take advantage of information asymmetry and regulatory loopholes to take opportunistic behavior, which affects the project delivery quality and public interests. In order to reveal the decision-making mechanism of the main stakeholders, this paper constructs an evolutionary game model of private companies, citizens and the government from a fresh perspective of perceived value. First, the traditional payoff matrix is modified by combining Prospect Theory and Mental Accounting. Next, this paper analyzes the strategic evolution law and stability conditions of game players by replicated dynamic equation. Finally, Nanganqu project is used for empirical simulation to verify the effectiveness of this model. Results indicate that, (1) due to the complexity of the project and the bounded rationality of the participants, there is no evolutionary stable strategy in this game system. (2) The behavioral decision of participants is affected by perceived incomes and perceived costs. (3) Government punishment and reputation loss can effectively curb the opportunistic behavior. All above studies are expected to improve the management of Sponge City PPP projects, providing theoretical guidance for the government to make scientific decisions.

Unraveling Negative Expectations and Nocebo-Related Effects in Musculoskeletal Pain

This Perspective adapts the ViolEx Model, a framework validated in several clinical conditions, to better understand the role of expectations in the recovery and/or maintenance of musculoskeletal (MSK) pain. Here, particular attention is given to the condition in which dysfunctional expectations are maintained despite no longer being supported by confirmatory evidence (i.e., belief-lifting the arm leads to permanent tendon damage; evidence-after the patient lifts the arm no tendon damage occurs). While the ViolEx Model suggests that cognitive immunization strategies are responsible for the maintenance of dysfunctional expectations, we suggest that such phenomenon can also be understood from a Bayesian Brain perspective, according to which the level of precision of the priors (i.e., expectations) is the determinant factor accounting for the extent of priors' updating (i.e., we merge the two frameworks, suggesting that highly precise prior can lead to cognitive immunization responses). Importantly, this Perspective translates the theory behind these two frameworks into clinical suggestions. Precisely, it is argued that different strategies should be implemented when treating MSK pain patients, depending on the nature of their expectations (i.e., positive or negative and the level of their precision).

Psychological Dimensions Relevant to Motivation and Pleasure in Schizophrenia

Motivation and pleasure deficits are common in schizophrenia, strongly linked with poorer functioning, and may reflect underlying alterations in brain functions governing reward processing and goal pursuit. While there is extensive research examining cognitive and reward mechanisms related to these deficits in schizophrenia, less attention has been paid to psychological characteristics that contribute to resilience against, or risk for, motivation and pleasure impairment. For example, psychological tendencies involving positive future expectancies (e.g., optimism) and effective affect management (e.g., reappraisal, mindfulness) are associated with aspects of reward anticipation and evaluation that optimally guide goal-directed behavior. Conversely, maladaptive thinking patterns (e.g., defeatist performance beliefs, asocial beliefs) and tendencies that amplify negative cognitions (e.g., rumination), may divert cognitive resources away from goal pursuit or reduce willingness to exert effort. Additionally, aspects of sociality, including the propensity to experience social connection as positive reinforcement may be particularly relevant for pursuing social goals. In the current review, we discuss the roles of several psychological characteristics with respect to motivation and pleasure in schizophrenia. We argue that individual variation in these psychological dimensions is relevant to the study of motivation and reward processing in schizophrenia, including interactions between these psychological dimensions and more well-characterized cognitive and reward processing contributors to motivation. We close by emphasizing the value of considering a broad set of modulating factors when studying motivation and pleasure functions in schizophrenia.

Is depression associated with reduced optimistic belief updating?

When asked to evaluate their probability of experiencing a negative life event, healthy individuals update their beliefs more following good news than bad. This is referred to as optimistic belief updating. By contrast, individuals with depression update their beliefs by a similar amount, showing reduced optimism. We conducted the first independent replication of this effect and extended this work to examine whether reduced optimistic belief updating in depression also occurs for positive life events. Replicating previous research, healthy and depression groups differed in belief updating for negative events (β = 0.71, 95% CI: 0.24, 1.18). Whereas healthy participants updated their beliefs more following good news than bad, individuals experiencing depression lacked this bias. However, our findings for positive events were inconclusive. While we did not find statistical evidence that patterns of belief updating between groups varied by valence (β = -0.51, 95% CI: -1.16, 0.15), mean update scores suggested that both groups showed largely similar updating for positive life events. Our results add confidence to previous findings that depression is characterized by negative future expectations maintained by reduced updating in response to good news. However, further research is required to understand the specificity of this to negative events, and into refining methods for quantifying belief updating in clinical and non-clinical research.

Different drives of herding: An exploratory study of motivations underlying social conformity

We often align our behaviors, attitudes, and opinions in line with a majority of others, a phenomenon known as "social conformity." A seminal framework has proposed that conformity behaviors are mainly driven by three fundamental motives: a desire to gain more information to be accurate, to obtain social approval from others, and to maintain a favorable self-concept. However, previous studies usually have interpreted conformity behaviors as driven by one motive or another, largely ignoring the fact that human behaviors could be concurrently induced by multiple and even conflicting motivations. Adopting a typical conformity paradigm widely used in previous studies, we explored distinct and concurrent motives underlying the same conformity behavior, combining personality and individual differences with more nuanced analyses of observed conformity behaviors. Our findings provide novel evidence to show that three motivations exist within a single conformity behavior, suggesting that multiple motivations drive the conformity concurrently. These findings provide a potential solution for the extensive debate about what drives human social conformity and help to better understand the conformity behavior in daily life.

No Evidence for the Involvement of Cognitive Immunisation in Updating Beliefs About the Self in Three Non-Clinical Samples

BACKGROUND

Cognitive immunisation against disconfirmatory evidence (i.e., devaluing expectation-disconfirming information through cognitive mechanisms) has recently been discussed as an obstacle to the revision of dysfunctional beliefs in mental disorders such as depression. Yet, it is unclear whether cognitive immunisation is also involved in belief updating in non-clinical samples.

METHODS

Using a three-group modulation protocol (promotion vs. inhibition of cognitive immunisation vs. control group), we examined how cognitive immunisation influences belief updating in response to performance feedback in three non-clinical samples. In Experiments 1 (N = 99) and 2 (N = 93), participants received unexpectedly negative feedback, whereas participants from Experiment 3 (N = 118) received unexpectedly positive feedback. Depressive symptoms and dispositional optimism were examined as additional predictors of belief updating.

RESULTS

In all experiments, participants adjusted their expectations in line with the feedback received, but this effect was not influenced by the cognitive immunisation manipulation. In Experiment 3, expectation change remained stable over 2 weeks. Depressive symptoms were associated with a reduced integration of positive feedback, but not with an increased sensitivity to negative feedback.

CONCLUSIONS

Whereas previous research has shown that cognitive immunisation contributes to persistent beliefs in clinical populations, the present findings suggest that it does not affect belief updating in non-clinical samples.

SUPPLEMENTARY INFORMATION

The online version contains supplementary material available at 10.1007/s10608-021-10256-y.

A Revised Framework for the Investigation of Expectation Update Versus Maintenance in the Context of Expectation Violations: The ViolEx 2.0 Model

Expectations are probabilistic beliefs about the future that shape and influence our perception, affect, cognition, and behavior in many contexts. This makes expectations a highly relevant concept across basic and applied psychological disciplines. When expectations are confirmed or violated, individuals can respond by either updating or maintaining their prior expectations in light of the new evidence. Moreover, proactive and reactive behavior can change the probability with which individuals encounter expectation confirmations or violations. The investigation of predictors and mechanisms underlying expectation update and maintenance has been approached from many research perspectives. However, in many instances there has been little exchange between different research fields. To further advance research on expectations and expectation violations, collaborative efforts across different disciplines in psychology, cognitive (neuro)science, and other life sciences are warranted. For fostering and facilitating such efforts, we introduce the ViolEx 2.0 model, a revised framework for interdisciplinary research on cognitive and behavioral mechanisms of expectation update and maintenance in the context of expectation violations. To support different goals and stages in interdisciplinary exchange, the ViolEx 2.0 model features three model levels with varying degrees of specificity in order to address questions about the research synopsis, central concepts, or functional processes and relationships, respectively. The framework can be applied to different research fields and has high potential for guiding collaborative research efforts in expectation research.

Viruses, Vaccines, and COVID-19: Explaining and Improving Risky Decision-making

Risky decision-making lies at the center of the COVID-19 pandemic and will determine future viral outbreaks. Therefore, a critical evaluation of major explanations of such decision-making is of acute practical importance. We review the underlying mechanisms and predictions offered by expectancy-value and dual-process theories. We then highlight how fuzzy-trace theory builds on these approaches and provides further insight into how knowledge, emotions, values, and metacognitive inhibition influence risky decision-making through its unique mental representational architecture (i.e., parallel verbatim and gist representations of information). We discuss how social values relate to decision-making according to fuzzy-trace theory, including how categorical gist representations cue core values. Although gist often supports health-promoting behaviors such as vaccination, social distancing, and mask-wearing, why this is not always the case as with status-quo gist is explained, and suggestions are offered for how to overcome the "battle for the gist" as it plays out in social media.

Optimism where there is none: Asymmetric belief updating observed with valence-neutral life events

How people update their beliefs when faced with new information is integral to everyday life. A sizeable body of literature suggests that people's belief updating is optimistically biased, such that their beliefs are updated more in response to good news than bad news. However, recent research demonstrates that findings previously interpreted as evidence of optimistic belief updating may be the result of flaws in experimental design, rather than motivated reasoning. In light of this controversy, we conduct three pre-registered variations of the standard belief updating paradigm (combined N = 300) in which we test for asymmetric belief updating with neutral, non-valenced stimuli using analytic approaches found in previous research. We find evidence of seemingly biased belief updating with neutral stimuli - results that cannot be attributed to a motivational, valence-based, optimism account - and further show that there is uninterpretable variability across samples and analytic techniques. Jointly, these results serve to highlight the methodological flaws in current optimistic belief updating research.

Guilt and Shame of What Might Have Been in Optimistic Offender Drivers

Habitual offender drivers are required to recover points lost on their driving license by attending reeducation courses, an experience that may, upon reflection of the incident in question, induce feelings of guilt or shame for the infractions they committed. A simulated driving task studied optimistic offender drivers to analyze the extent to which the controllability of the situational context influenced their use of internal and external factors in counterfactual thoughts and emotions such as guilt and shame. The study involved 160 drivers, of whom 54 were categorized as repeat offender drivers while 106 drivers attended courses for advanced professional driving licenses. The participants drove along a route in a driving simulator, which had been previously adjusted for the difficulty to generate a perception of high or low control. Based on the outcome obtained by the participants in this stage, each driver had to report which resources they required to improve their outcomes. Different factor ANOVAs were used to analyze our findings. The results indicated that optimistic offenders, unlike other groups (i.e., optimistic non-offender and pessimistic non-offender), thought that their results could have been better if external factors had been present (i.e., upward counterfactuals), both under conditions of high and low control. They believed their results would have been worse had it not been for their internal resources (i.e., downward counterfactuals), especially under conditions of low control. Concerning emotions of guilt and shame, offender optimists had the lowest values in both conditions compared with the other groups. We may contend that optimistic offender drivers thought they could have obtained better outcomes if external factors had been involved. In the low control condition, they justified that if it were not for such internal skills, their results could have been worse. When they generated such thoughts, the emotions of guilt and shame were minimal.

By chance or by choice? Biased attribution of others' outcomes when social preferences matter

Decision makers in positions of power often make unobserved choices under risk and uncertainty. In many cases, they face a trade-off between maximizing their own payoff and those of other individuals. What inferences are made in such instances about their choices when only outcomes are observable? We conduct two experiments that investigate whether outcomes are attributed to luck or choices. Decision makers choose between two investment options, where the more costly option has a higher chance of delivering a good outcome (that is, a higher payoff) for the group. We show that attribution biases exist in the evaluation of good outcomes. On average, good outcomes of decision makers are attributed more to luck as compared to bad outcomes. This asymmetry implies that decision makers get too little credit for their successes. The biases are exhibited by those individuals who make or would make the less prosocial choice for the group as decision makers, suggesting that a consensus effect may be shaping both the belief formation and updating processes.

SUPPLEMENTARY INFORMATION

The online version contains supplementary material available at 10.1007/s10683-021-09731-w.

Dispositional and situational predictors of coping with violated achievement expectations

Most students experience expectation violations during their academic career, such as unexpected failed tests. However, contradictory evidence does not always result in expectation change (accommodation). Expectations often persist through stronger efforts to fulfil the expectation (assimilation) or ignoring the discrepancy (immunisation). Our study addresses possible situational and dispositional predictors that may be decisive influences on the use of the three coping strategies. We conducted an experimental study with n = 439 students who experienced an expectation violation in an achievement test. Dispositional coping tendencies, valence of expectation violation, and the interaction of valence and degree of expectation violation were found to predict situational coping. Furthermore, higher need for cognitive closure predicted stronger accommodation, and a large degree of expectation violation predicted stronger immunisation. Thus, our study provides initial evidence on which situational and dispositional factors predict coping with expectation violations in an educational context. Expectation violation in a performance context mainly resulted in stronger efforts to protect positive achievement expectations.

Sympathetic involvement in time-constrained sequential foraging

Appraising sequential offers relative to an unknown future opportunity and a time cost requires an optimization policy that draws on a learned estimate of an environment’s richness. Converging evidence points to a learning asymmetry, whereby estimates of this richness update with a bias toward integrating positive information. We replicate this bias in a sequential foraging (prey selection) task and probe associated activation within the sympathetic branch of the autonomic system, using trial-by-trial measures of simultaneously recorded cardiac autonomic physiology. We reveal a unique adaptive role for the sympathetic branch in learning. It was specifically associated with adaptation to a deteriorating environment: it correlated with both the rate of negative information integration in belief estimates and downward changes in moment-to-moment environmental richness, and was predictive of optimal performance on the task. The findings are consistent with a framework whereby autonomic function supports the learning demands of prey selection.

The Role of User Behaviour in Improving Cyber Security Management

Information security has for long time been a field of study in computer science, software engineering, and information communications technology. The term 'information security' has recently been replaced with the more generic term cybersecurity. The goal of this paper is to show that, in addition to computer science studies, behavioural sciences focused on user behaviour can provide key techniques to help increase cyber security and mitigate the impact of attackers' social engineering and cognitive hacking methods (i.e., spreading false information). Accordingly, in this paper, we identify current research on psychological traits and individual differences among computer system users that explain vulnerabilities to cyber security attacks and crimes. Our review shows that computer system users possess different cognitive capabilities which determine their ability to counter information security threats. We identify gaps in the existing research and provide possible psychological methods to help computer system users comply with security policies and thus increase network and information security.

Belief updating in bipolar disorder predicts time of recurrence

Bipolar disorder is a chronic relapsing condition in which mood episodes are interspersed with periods of wellbeing (euthymia). Shorter periods of euthymia are associated with poorer functioning, so it is crucial to identify predictors of relapse to facilitate treatment. Here, we test the hypothesis that specific valence-dependent learning patterns emerge prior to the clinical manifestation of a relapse, predicting its timing. The ability to update beliefs in response to positive and negative information was quantified in bipolar patients during euthymia, who were then monitored for 5 years. We found that reduced tendency to update beliefs in response to positive relative to negative information predicted earlier relapse. Less updating in response to positive information may generate pessimistic beliefs, which in turn can lead to more severe prodromal symptoms (e.g. sleep disturbance, irritability etc.). The results suggest that measuring valence-dependent belief updating could facilitate risk prediction in bipolar disorder.

When Beliefs Face Reality: An Integrative Review of Belief Updating in Mental Health and Illness

Belief updating is a relatively nascent field of research that examines how people adjust their beliefs in light of new evidence. So far, belief updating has been investigated in partly unrelated lines of research from different psychological disciplines. In this article, we aim to integrate these disparate lines of research. After presenting some prominent theoretical frameworks and experimental designs that have been used for the study of belief updating, we review how healthy people and people with mental disorders update their beliefs after receiving new information that supports or challenges their views. Available evidence suggests that both healthy people and people with particular mental disorders are prone to certain biases when updating their beliefs, although the nature of the respective biases varies considerably and depends on several factors. Anomalies in belief updating are discussed in terms of both new insights into the psychopathology of various mental disorders and societal implications, such as irreconcilable political and societal controversies due to the failure to take information into account that disconfirms one’s own view. We conclude by proposing a novel integrative model of belief updating and derive directions for future research.

Biased belief updating and suboptimal choice in foraging decisions

Deciding which options to engage, and which to forego, requires developing accurate beliefs about the overall distribution of prospects. Here we adapt a classic prey selection task from foraging theory to examine how individuals keep track of an environment’s reward rate and adjust choices in response to its fluctuations. Preference shifts were most pronounced when the environment improved compared to when it deteriorated. This is best explained by a trial-by-trial learning model in which participants estimate the reward rate with upward vs. downward changes controlled by separate learning rates. A failure to adjust expectations sufficiently when an environment becomes worse leads to suboptimal choices: options that are valuable given the environmental conditions are rejected in the false expectation that better options will materialize. These findings offer a previously unappreciated parallel in the serial choice setting of observations of asymmetric updating and resulting biased (often overoptimistic) estimates in other domains.

In some types of decision-making, people must accept or forego an option without knowing what prospects might later be available. Here, the authors reveal how a key bias– asymmetric learning from negative versus positive outcomes – emerges in this type of decision.

Rethinking post-traumatic stress disorder - A predictive processing perspective

Predictive processing has become a popular framework in neuroscience and computational psychiatry, where it has provided a new understanding of various mental disorders. Here, we apply the predictive processing account to post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD). We argue that the experience of a traumatic event in Bayesian terms can be understood as a perceptual hypothesis that is subsequently given a very high a-priori likelihood due to its (life-) threatening significance; thus, this hypothesis is re-selected although it does not fit the actual sensory input. Based on this account, we re-conceptualise the symptom clusters of PTSD through the lens of a predictive processing model. We particularly focus on re-experiencing symptoms as the hallmark symptoms of PTSD, and discuss the occurrence of flashbacks in terms of perceptual and interoceptive inference. This account provides not only a new understanding of the clinical profile of PTSD, but also a unifying framework for the corresponding pathologies at the neurobiological level. Finally, we derive directions for future research and discuss implications for psychological and pharmacological interventions.

The effect of induced optimism on the optimistic update bias

Background

Individuals tend to have an optimism bias, processing desirable information more frequently than undesirable information. However, people who have been diagnosed with depression often have a more pessimistic view of the future. A recent study suggests that future expectations in individuals with dysphoria become more optimistic when asked to make optimistic future predictions about the future. In the present study, we investigated the differential effects of induced optimism training which making optimistic future prediction to change future beliefs in normal participants with various levels of dysphoria (low, mild, high).

Methods

We recruited normal participants (n = 69) from a local university students and divided participants into three groups (low, mild, high dysphoria) by measuring dysphoric mood. These three groups were assigned to the induced optimism training or control condition. After the training, participants performed the two-stage belief updating task. In the first stage, participants estimated their personal probability of experiencing adverse events while being presented with the average probability of the event occurring to a living person. This information could be desirable for participants(when presented with a probability that was below their estimation) or undesirable (when presented with a probability that was above their estimation). To assess how desirable versus undesirable information influenced beliefs, participants estimated their personal probability of experiencing the events again in the second stage. The amount of update error was calculated as the difference between the estimates in the first stage and the second stage. The difference between the errors was classified as the update bias.

Results

After the induced optimism training, individuals with the mild dysphoria demonstrated a higher update bias than low (p < .001) and the high dysphoria (p < .05) group in induced optimism condition. Significant differences were not found in control group. Results indicates that individuals in the mild dysphoria group showed an increased update bias after being exposed to the induced optimism training Dysphoric mood and trait optimism remained unchanged in both the experimental and control groups.

Conclusions

Results suggest that induced optimism training has potential to change individuals with mild dysphoria perceptions’ about the future.

Distorted Cognitive Processes in Major Depression: A Predictive Processing Perspective

The cognitive model of depression has significantly influenced the understanding of distorted cognitive processes in major depression; however, this model's conception of cognition has recently been criticized as possibly too broad and unspecific. In this review, we connect insights from cognitive neuroscience and psychiatry to suggest that the traditional cognitive model may benefit from a reformulation that takes current Bayesian models of the brain into account. Appealing to a predictive processing account, we explain that healthy human learning is normally based on making predictions and experiencing discrepancies between predicted and actual events or experiences. We present evidence suggesting that this learning mechanism is distorted in depression: current research indicates that people with depression tend to negatively reappraise or disregard positive information that disconfirms negative expectations, thus resulting in sustained negative predictions and biased learning. We also review the neurophysiological correlates of such deficits in processing prediction errors in people with depression. Synthesizing these findings, we propose a novel mechanistic model of depression suggesting that people with depression have the tendency to predominantly expect negative events or experiences, which they subjectively feel confirmed due to reappraisal of disconfirming evidence, thus creating a self-reinforcing negative feedback loop. Computationally, we consider too much precision afforded to negative prior beliefs as the main candidate of pathology, accompanied by an attenuation of positive prediction errors. We conclude by outlining some directions for future research into the understanding of the behavioral and neurophysiological underpinnings of this model and point to clinical implications of it.

Understanding persistent physical symptoms: Conceptual integration of psychological expectation models and predictive processing accounts

Persistent physical symptoms (PPS) are distressing, difficult to treat, and pose a major challenge to health care providers and systems. In this article, we review two disparate bodies of literature on PPS to provide a novel integrative model of this elusive condition. First, we draw on the clinical-psychological literature on the role of expectations to suggest that people with PPS develop dysfunctional expectations about health and disease that become increasingly immune to disconfirmatory information (such as medical reassurance) through cognitive reappraisal. Second, we invoke neuroscientific predictive processing accounts and propose that the psychological process of 'cognitive immunization' against disconfirmatory evidence corresponds, at the neurobiological and computational level, to too much confidence (i.e. precision) afforded to prior predictions. This can lead to an attenuation of disconfirming sensory information so that strong priors override benign bodily signals and make people believe that something serious is wrong with the body. Combining these distinct accounts provides a unifying framework for persistent physical symptoms and shifts the focus away from their causes to the sustaining mechanisms that prevent symptoms from subsiding spontaneously. Based on this integrative model, we derive new avenues for future research and discuss implications for treating people with PPS in clinical practice.

Can knowledge of election results change recall of our predictions? Neural correlates of political hindsight bias

Hindsight bias (HB) is the tendency to retrospectively exaggerate one’s foresight knowledge about the outcome of an event. Cognitive processes influenced by newly obtained outcome information are used to explain the HB phenomenon, but the neural correlates remain unknown. This study investigated HB in the context of election results using a memory design and functional magnetic resonance imaging for the first time. Participants were asked to predict and recall the percentage of votes obtained by (pairs of) candidates before and after an election. The results revealed that 88% of participants showed HB by recalling that their predictions were closer to the actual outcomes than they really were; and participants had HB for 38% of the events. The HB effect was associated with activation in the medial superior frontal gyrus and bilateral inferior frontal gyrus (IFG), which have been implicated in updating an old belief due to new information and is similar to the process of reconstruction bias. Furthermore, participants with a greater HB effect showed greater activation of the left IFG. In conclusion, we successfully observed the HB phenomenon in election results, and our imaging results suggested that the HB phenomenon might involve reconstruction bias.

Evidence accumulation is biased by motivation: A computational account

To make good judgments people gather information. An important problem an agent needs to solve is when to continue sampling data and when to stop gathering evidence. We examine whether and how the desire to hold a certain belief influences the amount of information participants require to form that belief. Participants completed a sequential sampling task in which they were incentivized to accurately judge whether they were in a desirable state, which was associated with greater rewards than losses, or an undesirable state, which was associated with greater losses than rewards. While one state was better than the other, participants had no control over which they were in, and to maximize rewards they had to maximize accuracy. Results show that participants’ judgments were biased towards believing they were in the desirable state. They required a smaller proportion of supporting evidence to reach that conclusion and ceased gathering samples earlier when reaching the desirable conclusion. The findings were replicated in an additional sample of participants. To examine how this behavior was generated we modeled the data using a drift-diffusion model. This enabled us to assess two potential mechanisms which could be underlying the behavior: (i) a valence-dependent response bias and/or (ii) a valence-dependent process bias. We found that a valence-dependent model, with both a response bias and a process bias, fit the data better than a range of other alternatives, including valence-independent models and models with only a response or process bias. Moreover, the valence-dependent model provided better out-of-sample prediction accuracy than the valence-independent model. Our results provide an account for how the motivation to hold a certain belief decreases the need for supporting evidence. The findings also highlight the advantage of incorporating valence into evidence accumulation models to better explain and predict behavior.

People tend to gather information before making judgments. As information is often unlimited a decision has to be made as to when the data is sufficient to reach a conclusion. Here, we show that the decision to stop gathering data is influenced by whether the data points towards the desired conclusion. Importantly, we characterize the factors that generate this behaviour using a valence-dependent evidence accumulation model. In a sequential sampling task participants sampled less evidence before reaching a desirable than undesirable conclusion. Despite being incentivized for accuracy, participants’judgments were biased towards believing they were in a desirable state. Fitting the data to an evidence accumulation model revealed this behavior was due both to the starting point and rate of evidence accumulation being biased towards desirable beliefs. Our results show that evidence accumulation is altered by what people want to believe and provide an account for how this modulation is generated.

More Realistic Forecasting of Future Life Events After Psilocybin for Treatment-Resistant Depression

Background: Evidence suggests that classical psychedelics can promote enduring changes in personality, attitudes and optimism, as well as improvements in mental health outcomes. Aim: To investigate the effects of a composite intervention, involving psilocybin, on pessimism biases in patients with treatment-resistant depression (TRD). Methods: Patients with TRD (n = 15) and matched, untreated non-depressed controls (n = 15) performed the Prediction Of Future Life Events (POFLE) task. The POFLE task requires participants to predict the likelihood of certain life events occurring within a 30-day period, after which the actual rate of event occurrence is reported; this gives an index of potential pessimism versus optimism bias. Psilocybin was administered in two oral dosing sessions (10 and 25 mg) one week apart. Main outcome measures were collected at baseline and one week after the second dosing session. Results: Patients showed a significant pessimism bias at baseline [t(14) = -3.260, p = 0.006; 95% CI (-0.16, -0.03), g = 1.1] which was related to the severity of their depressive symptoms (r_s = -0.55, p = 0.017). One week after psilocybin treatment, this bias was significantly decreased [t(14) = -2.714, p = 0.017; 95% CI (-0.21, -0.02), g = 0.7] and depressive symptoms were greatly improved [t(14) = 7.900, p < 0.001; 95% CI (16.17, 28.23), g = 1.9]; moreover, the magnitude of change in both variables was significantly correlated (r = -0.57, p = 0.014). Importantly, post treatment, patients became significantly more accurate at predicting the occurrence of future life events [t(14) = 1.857, p = 0.042; 95% CI (-0.01, 0.12), g = 0.6] whereas no such change was observed in the control subjects. Conclusion: These findings suggest that psilocybin with psychological support might correct pessimism biases in TRD, enabling a more positive and accurate outlook.

Pre-implantation genetic testing: decisional factors to accept or decline among in vitro fertilization patients

PURPOSE

Embryo testing to improve pregnancy outcomes among individuals who are seeking assisted reproduction technologies is increasing. The purpose of this study was to assess decisional factors through in-depth interviews for why women would accept or decline preimplantation genetic testing for aneuploidy (PGT-A) with in vitro fertilization (IVF).

METHODS

Semi-structured telephone interviews were conducted with 37 women who were offered PGT-A with IVF during the summer 2017. Interviews lasted on average 40 min and were audio-recorded, transcribed, and analyzed using a content analysis.

RESULTS

Results identified a number of decisional factors related to values about conception, disability, and pregnancy termination, past pregnancy experiences, optimism toward technology, and cost. Other key issues that were identified include the use of expanded carrier screening prior to IVF, maternal age, and limited education about PGT-A due to the complexity about education for IVF alone.

CONCLUSION

There is a need to develop decision support tools for the increasing choices of genetic testing options for patients seeking IVF. Including patients' values, past pregnancy experiences and attitudes toward science into the decision-making process may help promote a more informed decision.

Influence of vmPFC on dmPFC Predicts Valence-Guided Belief Formation

When updating beliefs about their future prospects, people tend to disregard bad news. By combining fMRI with computational and dynamic causal modeling, we identified neurocircuitry mechanisms underlying this optimism bias to test for valence-guided belief formation. In each trial of the fMRI task, participants (n = 24, 10 male) estimated the base rate (eBR) and their risks of experiencing negative future events, were confronted with the actual BR, and finally had the opportunity to update their initial self-related risk estimate. We demonstrated an optimism bias by revealing greater belief updates in response to good over bad news (i.e., learning that the actual BR is lower or higher than expected) while controlling for confounds (estimation error and personal relevance of the new information). Updating was favorable when the final belief about risks improved (or at least did not worsen) relative to the initial risk estimate. This valence of updating was encoded by the ventromedial prefrontal cortex (vmPFC) associated with the valuation of rewards. Within the updating circuit, the vmPFC filtered the incoming signal in a valence-dependent manner and influenced the dorsomedial prefrontal cortex (dmPFC). Both the valence-encoding activity in the vmPFC and its influence on the dmPFC predicted individual magnitudes of the optimism bias. Our results indicate that updating was biased by the motivation to maximize desirable beliefs, mediated by the influence of the valuation system on further cognitive processing. Therefore, although it provides the very basis for human reasoning, belief formation is essentially distorted to promote desired conclusions.SIGNIFICANCE STATEMENT The question of whether human reasoning is biased by desires and goals is crucial for everyday social, professional, and economic decisions. How much our belief formation is influenced by what we want to believe is, however, still debated. Our study confirms that belief updates are indeed optimistically biased. Critically, the bias depends on the recruitment of the brain valuation system and the influence of this system on neural regions involved in reasoning. These neurocircuit interactions support the notion that the motivation to maximize pleasant beliefs reinforces those cognitive processes that are most likely to yield the desired conclusion.

Updating Beliefs under Perceived Threat

Humans are better at integrating desirable information into their beliefs than undesirable information. This asymmetry poses an evolutionary puzzle, as it can lead to an underestimation of risk and thus failure to take precautionary action. Here, we suggest a mechanism that can speak to this conundrum. In particular, we show that the bias vanishes in response to perceived threat in the environment. We report that an improvement in participants' tendency to incorporate bad news into their beliefs is associated with physiological arousal in response to threat indexed by galvanic skin response and self-reported anxiety. This pattern of results was observed in a controlled laboratory setting (Experiment I), where perceived threat was manipulated, and in firefighters on duty (Experiment II), where it naturally varied. Such flexibility in how individuals integrate information may enhance the likelihood of responding to warnings with caution in environments rife with threat, while maintaining a positivity bias otherwise, a strategy that can increase well-being.SIGNIFICANCE STATEMENT The human tendency to be overly optimistic has mystified scholars and lay people for decades: How could biased beliefs have been selected over unbiased beliefs? Scholars have suggested that although the optimism bias can lead to negative outcomes, including financial collapse and war, it can also facilitate health and productivity. Here, we demonstrate that a mechanism generating the optimism bias, namely asymmetric information integration, evaporates under threat. Such flexibility could result in enhanced caution in dangerous environments while supporting an optimism bias otherwise, potentially increasing well-being.

Mediation effect of beliefs about pleasure and emotional experience between social anhedonia and prediction of pleasant events

Few studies have examined whether there is a relationship between social anhedonia and prediction of future events and the role of beliefs about pleasure and emotional experience. In this study, 513 college students were recruited to complete a set of self-reported questionnaires, including the Revised Social Anhedonia Scale (CSAS), the Temporal Experience of Pleasure Scale (TEPS), the Belief about Pleasure Scale (BAPS) and the Beck Depression Inventory. Moreover, a checklist of 100 daily life events was also administrated to all participants. Mediation analysis found that social anhedonia had a direct impact on prediction of pleasant events. Emotional experience partly mediated the relationship between social anhedonia and subjective prediction of pleasant events. However, beliefs about pleasure had no significant mediation effect between social anhedonia and prediction of pleasant events, but were shown to influence the subjective prediction of pleasant events completely through emotional experience. These findings suggest that beliefs about pleasure and emotional experience may be considered promising factors for interventions in individuals with anhedonia.

Low foreign language proficiency reduces optimism about the personal future

Optimistic estimates about the personal future constitute one of the best-described and most-debated decision biases related to emotion. Nevertheless, it has been difficult to isolate manipulations that reduce optimistic estimates. Eliciting estimates in a foreign language is a promising candidate manipulation because foreign language use alters decision biases in scenarios with emotional components. Consequently, we tested whether foreign language use reduces optimistic estimates. In a laboratory experiment, participants ( n = 45) estimated their probability of experiencing life events either in their native language or a foreign language, in which they were highly proficient. We found no differences in these estimates or in the updating of these estimates after receiving feedback about the population baseline probability. Importantly, three online experiments with large sample sizes ( ns = 706, 530, and 473) showed that using a foreign language with low proficiency reduced comparative optimism. Participants in the online experiments had diverse proficiency levels and were matched on a variety of control metrics. Fine-grained analyses indicated that low proficiency weakens the coupling between probability estimates and rated arousal. Overall, our findings suggest that an important decision bias can be reduced when using a foreign language with low proficiency.

Concern for Others Leads to Vicarious Optimism

An optimistic learning bias leads people to update their beliefs in response to better-than-expected good news but neglect worse-than-expected bad news. Because evidence suggests that this bias arises from self-concern, we hypothesized that a similar bias may affect beliefs about other people's futures, to the extent that people care about others. Here, we demonstrated the phenomenon of vicarious optimism and showed that it arises from concern for others. Participants predicted the likelihood of unpleasant future events that could happen to either themselves or others. In addition to showing an optimistic learning bias for events affecting themselves, people showed vicarious optimism when learning about events affecting friends and strangers. Vicarious optimism for strangers correlated with generosity toward strangers, and experimentally increasing concern for strangers amplified vicarious optimism for them. These findings suggest that concern for others can bias beliefs about their future welfare and that optimism in learning is not restricted to oneself.

Valence-Dependent Belief Updating: Computational Validation

People tend to update beliefs about their future outcomes in a valence-dependent way: they are likely to incorporate good news and to neglect bad news. However, belief formation is a complex process which depends not only on motivational factors such as the desire for favorable conclusions, but also on multiple cognitive variables such as prior beliefs, knowledge about personal vulnerabilities and resources, and the size of the probabilities and estimation errors. Thus, we applied computational modeling in order to test for valence-induced biases in updating while formally controlling for relevant cognitive factors. We compared biased and unbiased Bayesian models of belief updating, and specified alternative models based on reinforcement learning. The experiment consisted of 80 trials with 80 different adverse future life events. In each trial, participants estimated the base rate of one of these events and estimated their own risk of experiencing the event before and after being confronted with the actual base rate. Belief updates corresponded to the difference between the two self-risk estimates. Valence-dependent updating was assessed by comparing trials with good news (better-than-expected base rates) with trials with bad news (worse-than-expected base rates). After receiving bad relative to good news, participants' updates were smaller and deviated more strongly from rational Bayesian predictions, indicating a valence-induced bias. Model comparison revealed that the biased (i.e., optimistic) Bayesian model of belief updating better accounted for data than the unbiased (i.e., rational) Bayesian model, confirming that the valence of the new information influenced the amount of updating. Moreover, alternative computational modeling based on reinforcement learning demonstrated higher learning rates for good than for bad news, as well as a moderating role of personal knowledge. Finally, in this specific experimental context, the approach based on reinforcement learning was superior to the Bayesian approach. The computational validation of valence-dependent belief updating represents a novel support for a genuine optimism bias in human belief formation. Moreover, the precise control of relevant cognitive variables justifies the conclusion that the motivation to adopt the most favorable self-referential conclusions biases human judgments.