AGE-DIFFERENCES IN CHILDRENS CHOICE BEHAVIOR - THE IMPACT OF AVAILABLE ALTERNATIVES

The authors examine how children of different ages respond to the addition of new alternatives into an existing choice set. Children 4 to 12 years of age made choices from an initial and an expanded set of products using a modified constant sum allocation procedure. The findings indicate that younger children respond differently than older children to the expansion of choice sets and that this pattern is related, in part, to age differences in children's ability to incorporate similarity judgments into the choice process.