Should I Stay or Should I Go? The Cognition of Exploration and Exploitation

Decision-makers face a recurring choice: Repeat a past action in expectation of a familiar outcome (exploitation), or choose a novel action whose outcome is uncertain (exploration). Such decisions are fundamental in humans and animals. They are central to organizations, strategy, innovation, and entrepreneurship, where they have been studied extensively, mostly through simulations of agent-based models or analysis of archival and survey data....