THE IMPORTANCE OF INTER-TEMPORAL DISCOUNTING PROCESSES TO CONSUMER DECISION-MAKING (Az intertemporalis diszkontalasi folyamatok jelentosege a fogyasztoi dontesekben)

The study reports on an empirical comparison of four inter-temporal discounting theories. The examination measured in hypothetical decision-making situations the discounting rates of the respondents and compared them with the predictions of exponential and three kinds of hyperbolic discounting models. The data showed the 1992 Loewenstein-Prelec hyperbolic discounting model as predicting most accurately the aggregate mean of the discounting rates, while the exponential model proved to be weakest at this. However, Mazur's 1987 hyperbolic model came out best at predicting the individual responses. The findings point to the predictive (and possibly explanatory) power of the hyperbolic models, but not to a convincing extent. The estimate of the exponential model was also within the acceptable margin of error.