Research Interests
- Decision Making
- Cognitive Modeling
- Planning & Strategic Thinking
- Information Integration
- Behavioral Economics
Research Description
I study how people make decisions. I am particularly interested in complex choice scenarios, where people must, for example, search for information, learn from experience, or plan for the future. Much of my work takes a cognitive perspective, with the goal of explaining the decision process in terms of psychological constructs such as attention, perception, learning, and memory.
Through a combination of behavioral experiments and computational modeling, I develop and test new theories of decision making. I mathematically formalize these theories as computational models that I compare and select according to various methods. In doing so, my work links traditional research domains in Psychology, Economics, Marketing, Management, Game Design, AI, and Public Policy.
Education
Ph.D., Indiana University
Awards and Honors
Bruno de Finetti Prize, European Association for Decision Making (2015)
Courses Taught
Decisions & Judgments
Computational Cognitive Modeling
Learning & Decision Making
Additional Campus Affiliations
Assistant Professor, Psychology
Highlighted Publications
Hotaling, J. M., & Kellen, D. (2022). Dynamic decision making: Empirical and theoretical directions: Empirical and theoretical directions. In K. D. Federmeier (Ed.), Psychology of Learning and Motivation - Advances in Research and Theory (pp. 207-238). (Psychology of Learning and Motivation - Advances in Research and Theory; Vol. 76). Academic Press Inc.. https://doi.org/10.1016/bs.plm.2022.03.004
Vanunu, Y., Hotaling, J. M., Le Pelley, M. E., & Newell, B. R. (2021). How top-down and bottom-up attention modulate risky choice. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America, 118(39), Article e2025646118. https://doi.org/10.1073/PNAS.2025646118
Hotaling, J. M., Donkin, C., Jarvstad, A., & Newell, B. R. (2022). MEM-EX: An exemplar memory model of decisions from experience. Cognitive Psychology, 138, Article 101517. https://doi.org/10.31234/osf.io/fjhr9, https://doi.org/10.1016/j.cogpsych.2022.101517
Hotaling, J. M. (2020). Decision field theory-planning: A cognitive model of planning on the fly in multistage decision making. Decision, 7(1), 20-42. https://doi.org/10.1037/dec0000113
Vanunu, Y., Hotaling, J. M., & Newell, B. R. (2020). Elucidating the differential impact of extreme-outcomes in perceptual and preferential choice. Cognitive Psychology, 119, Article 101274. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.cogpsych.2020.101274
Recent Publications
Hotaling, J. M., Busemeyer, J. R., & Rieskamp, J. (2024). Psychological research and theories of preferential choice. In Handbook of Choice Modelling, Second Edition (pp. 49-73). Edward Elgar Publishing. https://doi.org/10.4337/9781800375635.00008
Hotaling, J. M., Gluth, S., & Rieskamp, J. (2023). Choice Deferral in Risky Decision Making: Using Cognitive Models to Understand Information Sampling Strategies. https://doi.org/10.31234/osf.io/s5zgc
DeCaro, D. A., DeCaro, M. S., Hotaling, J. M., & Appel, R. (2022). Formalizing the fundamental Faustian bargain: Inefficacious decision-makers sacrifice their freedom of choice to coercive leaders for economic security. PloS one, 17(9 September), e0275265. Article e0275265. https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0275265
Hotaling, J. M., & Kellen, D. (2022). Dynamic decision making: Empirical and theoretical directions: Empirical and theoretical directions. In K. D. Federmeier (Ed.), Psychology of Learning and Motivation - Advances in Research and Theory (pp. 207-238). (Psychology of Learning and Motivation - Advances in Research and Theory; Vol. 76). Academic Press Inc.. https://doi.org/10.1016/bs.plm.2022.03.004
Hotaling, J. M., Donkin, C., Jarvstad, A., & Newell, B. R. (2022). MEM-EX: An exemplar memory model of decisions from experience. Cognitive Psychology, 138, Article 101517. https://doi.org/10.31234/osf.io/fjhr9, https://doi.org/10.1016/j.cogpsych.2022.101517