Reliance on small samples, the wavy recency effect, and similarity-based learning.

Many behavioral phenomena, including underweighting of rare events and probability matching, can be the product of a tendency to rely on small samples of experiences. Why would small samples be used, and which experiences are likely to be included in these samples? Previous studies suggest that a cognitively efficient reliance on the most recent experiences can be very effective. We explore a very different and more cognitively demanding process...