Using eye-tracking, brain-imaging, psychophysiology and pharmacology, this research studies how people respond to complexity to improve decision-making and wellbeing.
The problem
Many people struggle to make major financial decisions – such as mortgage choice or acquiring life insurance – often leading to poor outcomes and low financial wellbeing. A key barrier to making those decisions is complexity: the complicated nature of products, the vast number to choose from, and inaccessibility of user interfaces. Currently, it is unclear what makes financial decisions complex and what level of complexity everyday Australians can handle.
The research
Professor Murawski and others have developed a theoretical framework to study complexity of decisions, which identifies sources of complexity and quantifies the degree of complexity of decisions. The team has conducted lab experiments using eye-tracking, brain-imaging, psychophysiology and pharmacology to understand how people respond to complexity. They then applied the insights to study complexity of real-life financial decisions and how the degree of complexity affects people’s ability to make good decisions, and to design interventions to improve decisions.
The impact
With an aim to improve people’s decision-making capabilities and wellbeing, the research is proving effective. Insights have been used to improve the regulation of consumer financial markets (in a project with an Australian regulatory agency); and to investigate the complexity of life insurance choice to make it easier for people to seek adequate cover (working with a global insurance company).
Department: Centre for Brain, Mind and Markets
Area: Decision-making
Sustainable Development Goals
We align our research activity with the United Nations' Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs).