title: Post-decision wagering objectively measures awareness.
abstract: The lack of an accepted measure of awareness has made claims that accurate decisions can be made without awareness controversial. Here we introduce a new objective measure of awareness, post-decision wagering. We show that participants fail to maximize cash earnings by wagering high following correct decisions in blindsight, the Iowa gambling task and an artificial grammar task. This demonstrates, without the uncertainties associated with the conventional subjective measures of awareness (verbal reports and confidence ratings), that the participants were not aware that their decisions were correct. Post-decision wagering may be used to study the neural correlates of consciousness.
authors.affiliation: Department of Experimental Psychology, South Parks Road, Oxford OX1 3UD, UK. nav.persaud@utoronto.ca
authors.forename: Navindra
authors.initials: N
authors.lastname: Persaud
authors.forename: Peter
authors.initials: P
authors.lastname: McLeod
authors.forename: Alan
authors.initials: A
authors.lastname: Cowey
mesh_terms: D000328:Adult; D001364:Awareness / Q000502:physiology*; D019575:Blindness, Cortical / Q000523:psychology; D001921:Brain / Q000502:physiology; D003243:Consciousness / Q000502:physiology*; D003657:Decision Making / Q000502:physiology*; D004192:Discrimination, Psychological / Q000502:physiology; D005260:Female; D005715:Gambling / Q000523:psychology*; D006801:Humans; D007807:Language Tests; D008297:Male; D008875:Middle Aged; D009483:Neuropsychological Tests; D012684:Sensory Thresholds / Q000502:physiology; D014473:Unconscious, Psychology; D014705:Verbal Behavior / Q000502:physiology