The Role of Past Information, Time, and Emotional Pressure in Heuristic Decision-Making

Unlike classical rational choice theory assumptions, decision-makers are far less rational and not always self-interested. Decision makers normally have less than perfect information, are faced with limited time to make decisions, fall into cognitive biases and reciprocate. Behavioural economics argues that decision-makers normally face “bounded rationality” and adopt simple, intuitive “rules of thumb” instead of calculating optimal solutions for every decision they make. Using behavioural economics insights, this paper explores how people with economic goals make economic decisions under time and emotional pressure. It studies how a goalkeeper as an economic agent makes decisions during a penalty session using data from the Spanish Premier Football League from 2015 to 2020. Results show that when a goalkeeper is under time pressure, he ends up making more accurate choices and predictions owing to greater mental concentration on the issue that demands considerable attention. Moreover, the increased pressure on the ball kicker causes him to make poor decisions, giving the goalkeeper additional flexibility. However, emotions were found to influence poor prediction and decisions because they impair information processing and the capacity to solve issues through heuristic decision-making techniques. Thus, the study on how decision-making is influenced can significantly improve strategic policymaking.