Chapter 1. Monty Hall
1.1 Introduction
Monty Hall
Back in 1963, a show named Let’s Make a Deal premiered with Monty Hall as the host. The final part of the show featured a player from the studio audience who was given a chance to pick one of three doors for a prize. The doors were labeled 1, 2, and 3. The interesting part is that after the player chose a door, say door 2, one of the other doors was opened, say door 3, to show that the prize was not behind that door. Now, the player gets the opportunity to change her choice. Does the player have better odds if she sticks with the original choice, picks the other door, or does it not matter? This task has come to be known as the Monty Hall problem. It has become a rich field of study for how humans make decisions in two-stage problems, in which they make decisions, and then are given more information. This is also your task in this experiment.
References:
De Neys, W., & Verschueren, N. (2006). Working memory capacity and a notorious brain teaser: The case of the Monty Hall dilemma. Experimental Psychology, 53(2), 123-131.
Jiang, Q., & Qinglin, Z. (2006). Causes of Monty Hall dilemma's difficulty. Psychological Science (China), 29(1), 222-224.
1.2 Experiment Setup
1.3 Instructions
Instructions
In the basic task, you will be presented with three doors labeled 1, 2, and 3. One of the three doors wins and the other two doors lose. Behind the winning door is the word WIN; there is nothing behind the losing doors. Your task is to pick the winning door. You pick a door by clicking on the door of your choice or by pressing the corresponding number on your keyboard. After you make your selection, one of the other two doors will be opened to show that it is a losing door. You now have the chance to stick with the same door or choose the other closed door. To keep the same door, you either click that door or the button that says Stay. To choose the other closed door, either click on that door or the button that says Switch.
On some trials, before the doors are presented, you will be shown a 3 X 3 grid with four random dots in the grid. Then you will do the task of picking doors, as described above. After you have finished that task, you will again be presented with the 3 X 3 grid. Click on the squares where you remember the dots had been. When you are done, press the space bar to continue the experiment.
Keyboard Responses
| Key | What Response Means |
|---|---|
| 1 | Door 1 |
| 2 | Door 2 |
| 3 | Door 3 |
1.4 Experiment
Begin Experiment
1.5 Results
Results
1.6 Quiz
Quiz