The Effect of Working Memory on Risk-Taking in Decision-Making Among a Sample of Syrian Youth

Abstract

Humans make numerous decisions—both simple and significant—in their daily lives. These decisions are influenced by internal factors related to the individual and external factors stemming from the surrounding environment, resulting in either rational or impulsive choices. To better understand the role of these factors, the present study aimed to answer the following question: Does verbal or spatial working memory affect risk-taking behavior during decision-making?

To address this question, 90 university students participated in an experiment utilizing the Balloon Analogue Risk Task (BART), a performance-based measure of risk-taking developed by Lejuez et al. (2002). The control group completed the BART without any modifications, while the first experimental group performed the

task concurrently with a digit-span memory task, and the second experimental group completed it alongside a spatial memory task involving square sequences. The study examined the impact of these conditions on four performance indicators: response time,

number of errors (balloon explosions), total earnings, and number of pumps per balloon.

The results revealed statistically significant differences between the experimental and control groups in both response times and number of pumps, in favor of the control group, at the 0.05 significance level. However, no significant differences were found in the number of errors or total earnings, indicating that working memory load had some impact on performance during decision-making tasks.