I Don’t Believe it But I Will Follow You: When Credibility Shapes Our Choices

(989 words, 5-minute read)

Have you picked a spot to dine as your parents said it’s fine?

Have you tried something absurd, just on your friend’s word?

Have you ever bought a product endorsed by a star?

If you wonder why, this post will answer that!

Every day, we make countless decisions relying on others. Although this is convenient, it can lead to risky behaviours. One notorious example can be the disinfectant injection incident during the COVID-19 pandemic. Donald Trump suggested injecting disinfectant as a treatment for coronavirus. Following this, the number of people who experienced accidental poisonings with household disinfectants rocketed by 121%. Although what Trump suggested appears undoubtedly unwise, some people still followed his advice. Did they do this simply because they perceived Trump as a credible political leader?

Trump recommending the injection of disinfectants.

The preference for credible advisors, judged by their accuracy and social reputation, is well-documented. Yet, the interaction between accuracy and social reputation remained in the dark. In light of this, we designed a study to explore the individual advice-taking tendency and how advisor credibility would affect this tendency. Specifically, we asked if we would still discount poor advice from a well-reputed advisor.

Based on previous research, we expected that:

Individuals would take advice from a more credible (i.e., more accurate and/or more reputed) advisor.
An advisor’s reputation would compensate for inaccurate advice.
Advice would improve learning (i.e., beliefs about the environment and task performance).

Method: The fishing task

Lake Bagel, Lake Pacman, and Jamie — An illustration of Lake Bagel, Lake Pacman, and our good friend Jamie.

We used the fishing task proposed by Papakonstantinou and colleagues to simulate decision-making in a novel environment. Participants went on a fishing vacation and chose between two lakes, Lake Bagel and Lake Pacman. They aimed to catch the most fish. A fishing expert named Jamie would come and help them. His credibility varied between participants. He had either a high or low social reputation, and gave either accurate or random advice.

In this task, participants freely explored the environment without guidance for the initial five trials and chose the lake with Jamie’s advice for the remaining 20 trials. They were informed the number of fish they caught at the chosen lake and the number of fish others caught at the alternative lake for each trial.

Overall, 139 adults completed the task. They also reported which lake they thought to have the most fish at the end. To enhance our understanding of the impact of advice, we also compared these participants’ data alongside the data from the study of Papakonstantinou and colleagues, where some participants performed the task without receiving any advice (yes, as a control condition).

Results: An effect of accurate advice on choice but not belief

Regardless of advisor accuracy and reputation, participants took the advice more than chance level (i.e., in 50% of trials). Consistent with our predictions, participants took the advice in more trials if 1) they received accurate advice rather than random advice and 2) they received advice from a well-reputed advisor and an ill-reputed advisor. There was no significant interaction between the advisor’s accuracy and the advisor’s reputation. A high social reputation could not shield the advisor from being discredited by others.

Although participants frequently followed the advice, they did NOT incorporate advice into their beliefs. There was no significant effect of advisor accuracy or advisor reputation on individuals’ belief of the ‘good’ lake (i.e., the lake where they could get the most fish). Participants estimated a 55%-67.5% likelihood of catching more fish in the ‘good’ lake, irrespective of advice received. Interestingly, when participants received accurate advice, they outperformed participants who received random or no advice and chose the ‘good’ lake more frequently.

Discussion: Credibility as the beacon of advice-taking

Our results clearly demonstrated individual tendency to take the advice when possible. Meanwhile, advisor credibility, reflected by advisor accuracy and advisor social reputation, can alter this tendency. Interestingly, although accurate advice can sway our decisions and improve task performance, it cannot influence individual beliefs about the environment.

Answering our research question, individuals generally take the advice, basing their decisions on the advisor credibility. A prestigious social reputation cannot protect this credibility when the advisor offers poor advice. Taken together, individuals learn the credibility of the advisor, and then learn from them.

But this project may be an imperfect simulation of real-life decision-making. In this experiment, participants received immediate feedback on the outcome. However, in the real world, we may receive delayed or even no feedback (just imagine an eBay bidding). To have a better overview of advice-taking in everyday life, future studies can test the tendency of advice-taking when we receive delayed or no feedback on outcomes.

Implication: A figure we trust

Although relying on others when making decisions can be harmful, we can channel this trait towards positive outcomes. For example, researchers have engaged community leaders boost the vaccination rate. These leaders, who may be religious figures or individuals with relevant personal experiences, act as trusted figures. They can communicate with others effectively and address specific concerns and misconceptions about vaccination. Evidence has shown how this approach increased the intention of vaccination, as mentioned by health workers:

“Earlier people refused to take vaccines. Now people are voluntarily coming to the session and taking vaccines.”

Check this video for an example of community leaders:

But it is still not the end…

Don’t feel ashamed if you have taken others’ advice for most of the time. After all, we are social animals who learn about the world from personal experience as well as others. A tendency to take the advice does not mean that you are a poor sheep following the shepherd. Following sound advice can save you significant time and resources that would otherwise be spent searching for the optimal option. But always be aware of the credibility of the advisor. Choose a trustworthy advisor, heed their advice wisely, and you will pave the way to a happily-ever-after. Remember: verify, trust, and thrive!

References

BBC News. (2020, April 24). Coronavirus: Outcry after Trump suggests injecting disinfectant as treatment. BBC News. https://www.bbc.com/news/world-us-canada-52407177
Kluger, J. (2020, May 12). Accidental Poisonings Increased After President Trump’s Disinfectant Comments. TIME. https://time.com/5835244/accidental-poisonings-trump/
Bonaccio, S., & Dalal, R. S. (2006). Advice taking and decision-making: An integrative literature review, and implications for the organizational sciences. Organizational Behavior and Human Decision Processes, 101(2), 127–151. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.obhdp.2006.07.001
Papakonstantinou, T., Raihani, N. & Lagnado, D. (2024) Belief updating patterns and social learning in stable and dynamic environments. Proceedings of the 46th Annual Conference of the Cognitive Science Society.
Afolabi, A. A., & Ilesanmi, O. S. (2021). Addressing COVID-19 vaccine hesitancy: Lessons from the role of community participation in previous vaccination programs. Health Promotion Perspectives, 11(4), 434–437. https://doi.org/10.34172/hpp.2021.54
Dhaliwal, B. K., Seth, R., Thankachen, B., Qaiyum, Y., Closser, S., Best, T., & Shet, A. (2023). Leading from the frontlines: Community-oriented approaches for strengthening vaccine delivery and acceptance. BMC Proceedings, 17(Suppl 7), 5. https://doi.org/10.1186/s12919-023-00259-w
ABC News (Director). (2021, April 1). In communities of color, religious leaders step up to help get people vaccinated. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=W1pmIFzl9JY

Credits

Cover picture downloaded from FreeImages: https://www.freeimages.com/photo/businesspeople-having-meeting-b-w-1935973.
In-text graphic 1 made using pictures from pixabay: https://pixabay.com/vectors/donald-trump-president-politics-2062441/, https://pixabay.com/vectors/hand-sanitizer-pump-bottle-dispenser-6944593/, https://pixabay.com/vectors/injection-doctor-needle-1597515/.
In-text graphics 2 made using pictures from Hertz et al., 2021:

Hertz, U., Bell, V., & Raihani, N. (2021). Trusting and learning from others: Immediate and long-term effects of learning from observation and advice. Proceedings of the Royal Society B: Biological Sciences, 288(1961), 20211414. https://doi.org/10.1098/rspb.2021.1414.