title: Are ambiguity aversion and ambiguity intolerance identical? A neuroeconomics investigation.
abstract: In recent years, there has been growing interest in understanding a person's reaction to ambiguous situations, and two similar constructs related to ambiguity, "ambiguity aversion" and "ambiguity intolerance," are defined in different disciplines. In the field of economic decision-making research, "ambiguity aversion" represents a preference for known risks relative to unknown risks. On the other hand, in clinical psychology, "ambiguity intolerance" describes the tendency to perceive ambiguous situations as undesirable. However, it remains unclear whether these two notions derived from different disciplines are identical or not. To clarify this issue, we combined an economic task, psychological questionnaires, and voxel-based morphometry (VBM) of structural brain magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) in a sample of healthy volunteers. The individual ambiguity aversion tendency parameter, as measured by our economic task, was negatively correlated with agreeableness scores on the self-reported version of the Revised NEO Personality Inventory. However, it was not correlated with scores of discomfort with ambiguity, one of the subscales of the Need for Closure Scale. Furthermore, the ambiguity aversion tendency parameter was negatively correlated with gray matter (GM) volume of areas in the lateral prefrontal cortex and parietal cortex, whereas ambiguity intolerance was not correlated with GM volume in any region. Our results suggest that ambiguity aversion, described in decision theory, may not necessarily be identical to ambiguity intolerance, referred to in clinical psychology. Cautious applications of decision theory to clinical neuropsychiatry are recommended.
authors.affiliation: Department of Psychiatry, Graduate School of Medicine, Kyoto University Kyoto, Japan.
authors.forename: Yusuke
authors.initials: Y
authors.lastname: Tanaka
authors.affiliation: Department of Psychiatry, Graduate School of Medicine, Kyoto University Kyoto, Japan.
authors.forename: Junya
authors.initials: J
authors.lastname: Fujino
authors.affiliation: Department of Psychology, Waseda University Tokyo, Japan.
authors.forename: Takashi
authors.initials: T
authors.lastname: Ideno
authors.affiliation: Department of Psychology, Waseda University Tokyo, Japan ; Research Center for Thinking and Behavioral Judgement, Keio University Tokyo, Japan.
authors.forename: Shigetaka
authors.initials: S
authors.lastname: Okubo
authors.affiliation: Department of Psychology, Waseda University Tokyo, Japan.
authors.forename: Kazuhisa
authors.initials: K
authors.lastname: Takemura
authors.affiliation: Department of Psychiatry, Graduate School of Medicine, Kyoto University Kyoto, Japan.
authors.forename: Jun
authors.initials: J
authors.lastname: Miyata
authors.affiliation: Department of Psychiatry, Graduate School of Medicine, Kyoto University Kyoto, Japan.
authors.forename: Ryosaku
authors.initials: R
authors.lastname: Kawada
authors.affiliation: Department of Psychiatry, Graduate School of Medicine, Kyoto University Kyoto, Japan.
authors.forename: Shinsuke
authors.initials: S
authors.lastname: Fujimoto
authors.affiliation: Department of Psychiatry, Graduate School of Medicine, Kyoto University Kyoto, Japan.
authors.forename: Manabu
authors.initials: M
authors.lastname: Kubota
authors.affiliation: Department of Psychiatry, Graduate School of Medicine, Kyoto University Kyoto, Japan.
authors.forename: Akihiko
authors.initials: A
authors.lastname: Sasamoto
authors.affiliation: Department of Psychiatry, Graduate School of Medicine, Kyoto University Kyoto, Japan.
authors.forename: Kimito
authors.initials: K
authors.lastname: Hirose
authors.affiliation: Department of Psychiatry, Graduate School of Medicine, Kyoto University Kyoto, Japan.
authors.forename: Hideaki
authors.initials: H
authors.lastname: Takeuchi
authors.affiliation: Human Brain Research Center, Graduate School of Medicine, Kyoto University Kyoto, Japan.
authors.forename: Hidenao
authors.initials: H
authors.lastname: Fukuyama
authors.affiliation: Department of Psychiatry, Graduate School of Medicine, Kyoto University Kyoto, Japan.
authors.forename: Toshiya
authors.initials: T
authors.lastname: Murai
authors.affiliation: Department of Psychiatry, Graduate School of Medicine, Kyoto University Kyoto, Japan.
authors.forename: Hidehiko
authors.initials: H
authors.lastname: Takahashi
keywords: agreeableness; ambiguity aversion; ambiguity intolerance; need for closure; prefrontal cortex; voxel-based morphometry