Proceedings of the Annual Meeting of the Cognitive Science Society

Experience from repeated analogous situations can bias subsequent decision-making, yet it remains unclear whether such effects arise from prior experience itself or the valence of that experience. We investigated whether prior gain or loss modulates subsequent uncertain decisions compared to a no-experience control. Participants completed a manipulated Iowa Gambling Task (M-IGT), inducing predetermined gain or loss, followed by the standard IGT. Prior experience group showed altered exploratory behavior in the early phase, with the loss group exhibiting early risk aversion. Behavioral differences across control and prior experience groups converged later in the task. The PVL-_ model revealed that prior experience initially reduced outcome sensitivity. In the later blocks, the gain group showed reduced learning rate and higher outcome sensitivity, indicating strategy stabilization. Prior loss was associated with higher choice consistency across all blocks. These findings suggest that prior experience transiently biases early exploration, while valence shapes decision consistency and learning flexibility.