Cognitive forecasting: How intuitive theories of attention shape anticipated risk preferences

How do people forecast their own and others' risk preferences? Although it is well established that affective forecasts shape decision-making, less is known about where these forecasts come from. Five studies demonstrate that people rely on intuitive theories of attention when forecasting future affect—such as dread and savoring while waiting for a risk to be resolved—with these affective forecasts in turn shaping willingness to take such risks. In Study 1, forecasts of the participant's own expectations and attention were systematically related to forecasts of positive and negative affect during a waiting period, which in turn predicted risk preferences. Studies 2a and 2b demonstrate substantial heterogeneity in intuitive attention–affect theories: some participants believed attention amplifies the emotional consequences of expectations, whereas others believed attention is uniformly affectively negative. These differences led to sharply divergent predictions about when attention should increase or decrease risk-taking. Study 3 shows that attention is also informative about expectations: participants differed in whether they believed attention signals optimism or pessimism, producing downstream consequences for affective forecasts and risk-taking. Finally, Study 4 reveals that many people endorse asymmetric causal models, viewing optimism as a cause of risk-taking, but risk-taking as a cause of attention. Together, these findings show that forecasts of risk preferences depend critically on people's intuitive theories about how cognition shapes affect and how affective utility is generated over time. By integrating affective forecasting, attention, and decision-making under uncertainty, this work highlights the role of metacognitive beliefs in shaping economic preferences.