UC San Diego

In this dissertation, I investigate how people determine the meaning of their own preferences and choices, as well as those of others, especially when those choices are driven by multiple causes such as internal conflicts, social expectations, or concerns about social evaluation. I approach this question through three lines of research: (1) the psychology of second-order preference conflicts, (2) causal inferences about others’ preferences, and (3) strategic signaling under social evaluation. Chapter 1 examines how choices can mask second-order preference conflicts: conflicts between the preferences people have and the preferences they wish to have. I propose a psychological framework for understanding these conflicts and provide initial evidence for an empirical measure of these conflicts. Chapter 2 explores how people infer others’ preferences from choices involving default options. I propose a causal reasoning account in which people reason backward from an observed choice to the plausible causes that led to that choice, whether they are preferences or alternative reasons from the choice context. I show that default options can provide such alternative explanations and explain away preferences. Chapter 3 investigates what people think their choices signal to others and how they use this knowledge strategically under social evaluation. I focus on reported self-control as a signal of cooperativeness and find that people inflate their reported self-control when observed by someone who may be a future cooperative partner. Across metacognitive, social, and functional perspectives, my work aims to shed light on how choices and preferences are a window to broader questions about who we are.