Dynamic MouselabWEB: Individualized Information Display Matrixes

Abstract

This paper introduces Dynamic MouselabWEB, a computerized process tracing tool that was designed to create flexible decision-making settings that are similar to real life. While Dynamic MouselabWEB is an extension of MouselabWEB, it differs in that it creates individualized information display matrixes (IDMs) rather than presenting predetermined IDMs, so participants decide on the attributes and alternatives before the decision task. This structure can improve the involvement of decision-makers in the decision process and it gives researchers a chance to observe decision-making behaviors and to explore new decision-making strategies when the decision task has only the decision-makers’ important attributes and appealing alternatives. In order to measure the effect of this dynamic structure, two groups of students worked on job selection tasks, one in the Dynamic MouselabWEB program (n = 32) and one in the traditional MouselabWEB program (n = 20). Results indicate a significant difference between the decision-making behaviors of these two groups. The students who chose a job on Dynamic MouselabWEB were informed more and they spent more time on task than the other group; in other words, they were involved more in the decision process.

Keywords

• decision making
• process tracing
• MouselabWEB
• information display matrix