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Symposium on ‘‘Cognition and Rationality: Part I’’ Relationships between rational decisions, human motives, and emotions

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Abstract

In the decision-making and rationality research field, rational decision theory (RDT) has always been the main framework, thanks to the elegance and complexity of its mathematical tools. Unfortunately, the formal refinement of the theory is not accompanied by a satisfying predictive accuracy, thus there is a big gap between what is predicted by the theory and the behaviour of real subjects. Here we propose a new foundation of the RDT, which has to be based on a cognitive architecture for reason-based agents, acting on the basis of their beliefs in order to achieve their goals. The decision process is a cognitive evaluation of conflicting goals, based on different beliefs and values, but also on emotions and desires. We refer to a cognitive analysis of emotions and we integrate them in this more general RDT.

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Notes

  1. We avoid the term “preferences” frequently used as synonym of “motives,” “goals,” etc. This use of “preferences” is seriously misleading. Preferences are not motives, they presuppose a set of motives (goals, desires, needs, ...) and just represent the fact that for the subject one motive is more important, has more value, than another one.

  2. Something close to Damasio’s “somatic markers” but less “embodied.”

  3. Of course, it is also reasonable to predict that the greater the absolute amount/value (5 or 20 dollars) the less probable will be the refusal. A real interesting issue to study is exactly the interaction between these two factors, in order to develop formal and quantitative models of it.

  4. On the contrary an instrumental goal, a means can be irrational when based on some irrational belief (ill-grounded, not justified, without evidence and implausible or contradictory with stronger beliefs) or due to some wrong planning or reasoning processes.

  5. Although we are not going to talk deeply about this here, in our view a theory of goal adoption is fundamental in understanding this kind of interaction.

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Acknowledgments

The last part of this work has been developed within the European Project Mind RACES—EC’s sixth Framework Programme, Unit: Cognitive Systems—No. 511931 (the section on anticipation and emotions) and the European Project HUMAINE (the section on Emotions and Cognitive Architecture).

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Consiglio Nazionale della Ricerche (CNR), Istituto di Scienze e Tecnologie Della Cognizione, Via San Martino della Battaglia 44, 00185, Rome, Italy

    Cristiano Castelfranchi, Francesca Giardini & Francesca Marzo

  2. Dipartimento di Scienze della Comunicazione, Università di Siena, Piazza San Francesco 8, 53100, Siena, Italy

    Cristiano Castelfranchi

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  1. Cristiano Castelfranchi
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  2. Francesca Giardini
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  3. Francesca Marzo
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Correspondence to Cristiano Castelfranchi.

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Castelfranchi, C., Giardini, F. & Marzo, F. Symposium on ‘‘Cognition and Rationality: Part I’’ Relationships between rational decisions, human motives, and emotions. Mind & Society 5, 173–197 (2006). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11299-006-0015-1

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