Reported violations of rationality may be aggregation artifacts

In PNAS, Tsetsos et al. (1) report intransitive preferences consistent with selective integration (SI) theory. The Condorcet paradox warns that aggregating transitive (rational) preferences readily creates intransitive (irrational) collective preferences (2). Therefore, any study reporting intransitive behavior must guard against aggregation artifacts (3). In experiments 1–3, Tsetsos et al. (1) reported significant evidence against a null and in favor of F W : P A B > 1 / 2 and P B C > 1 / 2 and P C A > 1 / 2 (Fig. 1), in data aggregated across participants to infer intransitive “frequent-winner” (FW) effects for “cyclic trials.” In experiment 4, they supported SI theory indirectly through significant violations of weak stochastic transitivity (WST) … [↵][1]1To whom correspondence should be addressed. Email: stoberc{at}missouri.edu. [1]: #xref-corresp-1-1

在《美国国家科学院院刊》（PNAS）中，采措斯等人（1）报告了与选择性整合（SI）理论相符的非传递性偏好。孔多塞悖论警示说，对传递性（理性的）偏好进行汇总很容易产生非传递性（非理性的）集体偏好（2）。因此，任何报告非传递性行为的研究都必须防范汇总假象（3）。在实验1 - 3中，采措斯等人（1）报告了有力证据，否定了零假设，并支持F_W：P_{AB}>1/2且P_{BC}>1/2且P_{CA}>1/2（图1），这些数据是通过对参与者进行汇总得出的，目的是推断“循环试验”中的非传递性“常胜”（FW）效应。在实验4中，他们通过对弱随机传递性（WST）的显著违背间接支持了SI理论…… [↵][1]1通信联系人。邮箱：stoberc{at}missouri.edu。 [1]: #xref - corresp - 1 - 1