{"status":"ok","message-type":"work","message-version":"1.0.0","message":{"indexed":{"date-parts":[[2026,6,18]],"date-time":"2026-06-18T23:38:00Z","timestamp":1781825880906,"version":"3.54.5"},"reference-count":35,"publisher":"MDPI AG","issue":"4","license":[{"start":{"date-parts":[[2019,12,16]],"date-time":"2019-12-16T00:00:00Z","timestamp":1576454400000},"content-version":"vor","delay-in-days":0,"URL":"https:\/\/creativecommons.org\/licenses\/by\/4.0\/"}],"content-domain":{"domain":[],"crossmark-restriction":false},"short-container-title":["Games"],"abstract":"<jats:p>This paper addresses the role of personality characteristics in decisions on the timing of an action, such as in the context of security and safety choices. Examples of such decisions include when to check log files for intruders and when to monitor financial accounts for fraud or errors. Two behavioral studies (n = 461) are conducted. Individual risk propensity and need for cognition are obtained via scales. The task is a game against an opaque computer opponent in which participants make decisions about the timing of actions in response to an unknown external risk factor. The task is not payoff-neutral w.r.t. risk. Difficulty is varied through the availability of explicitly given or decision-critical information, which is observable visually (Study 1) or in temporal memory (Study 2). Across this problem space, we find that risk propensity is not generally a hindrance in timing tasks. Participants of average risk propensity generally benefit from a high need for cognition, particularly when externalized memory is available, as in Study 1. In the more difficult temporal-estimation task, need for cognition was associated with increased payoffs from task experience. In both tasks, higher risk propensity in participants was associated with increased improvements in payoffs from task experience.<\/jats:p>","DOI":"10.3390\/g10040049","type":"journal-article","created":{"date-parts":[[2019,12,17]],"date-time":"2019-12-17T02:59:01Z","timestamp":1576551541000},"page":"49","update-policy":"https:\/\/doi.org\/10.3390\/mdpi_crossmark_policy","source":"Crossref","is-referenced-by-count":8,"title":["The Positive Impact of Task Familiarity, Risk Propensity, and Need For Cognition on Observed Timing Decisions in a Security Game"],"prefix":"10.3390","volume":"10","author":[{"ORCID":"https:\/\/orcid.org\/0000-0002-7887-8257","authenticated-orcid":false,"given":"David","family":"Reitter","sequence":"first","affiliation":[{"name":"Google Research, New York City, NY 10011, USA"}],"role":[{"vocabulary":"crossref","role":"author"}]},{"ORCID":"https:\/\/orcid.org\/0000-0003-1093-1282","authenticated-orcid":false,"given":"Jens","family":"Grossklags","sequence":"additional","affiliation":[{"name":"Technical University of Munich, Department of Informatics, 85748 Garching, Germany"}],"role":[{"vocabulary":"crossref","role":"author"}]}],"member":"1968","published-online":{"date-parts":[[2019,12,16]]},"reference":[{"key":"ref_1","doi-asserted-by":"crossref","first-page":"26","DOI":"10.1109\/MSP.2005.22","article-title":"Privacy and Rationality in Individual Decision Making","volume":"3","author":"Acquisti","year":"2005","journal-title":"IEEE Secur. Priv."},{"key":"ref_2","doi-asserted-by":"crossref","first-page":"183","DOI":"10.1163\/22134468-20181118","article-title":"Impatience in Timing Decisions: Effects and Moderation","volume":"6","author":"Ghafurian","year":"2018","journal-title":"Timing Time Percept."},{"key":"ref_3","unstructured":"West, R., and Stewart, T. (2013, January 11\u201314). Risk-Seeking in a Continuous Game of Timing. Proceedings of the 12th International Conference on Cognitive Modelling, Ottawa, ON, Canada."},{"key":"ref_4","doi-asserted-by":"crossref","unstructured":"Grossklags, J., and Reitter, D. (2014, January 19\u201322). How Task Familiarity and Cognitive Predispositions Impact Behavior in a Security Game of Timing. Proceedings of the 2014 IEEE 27th Computer Security Foundations Symposium, Vienna, Austria.","DOI":"10.1109\/CSF.2014.16"},{"key":"ref_5","doi-asserted-by":"crossref","first-page":"655","DOI":"10.1007\/s00145-012-9134-5","article-title":"FlipIt: The Game of \u201cStealthy Takeover\u201d","volume":"26","author":"Juels","year":"2013","journal-title":"J. Cryptol."},{"key":"ref_6","doi-asserted-by":"crossref","unstructured":"Baron, J. (2004). Normative Models of Judgment and Decision Making. Blackwell Handbook of Judgment and Decision Making, Blackwell Publishing Ltd.","DOI":"10.1002\/9780470752937.ch2"},{"key":"ref_7","doi-asserted-by":"crossref","first-page":"869","DOI":"10.1016\/j.paid.2010.11.037","article-title":"Individual Differences in Risk-Propensity: Associations Between Personality and Behavioral Measures of Risk","volume":"50","author":"Mishra","year":"2011","journal-title":"Personal. Individ. Differ."},{"key":"ref_8","doi-asserted-by":"crossref","first-page":"116","DOI":"10.1037\/0022-3514.42.1.116","article-title":"The Need for Cognition","volume":"42","author":"Cacioppo","year":"1982","journal-title":"J. Personal. Soc. Psychol."},{"key":"ref_9","doi-asserted-by":"crossref","first-page":"1506","DOI":"10.1111\/j.1559-1816.2008.00357.x","article-title":"Measuring an Individual\u2019s Tendency to Take Risks: The Risk Propensity Scale","volume":"38","author":"Meertens","year":"2008","journal-title":"J. Appl. Soc. Psychol."},{"key":"ref_10","doi-asserted-by":"crossref","first-page":"1","DOI":"10.1207\/S15327663JCP1201_01","article-title":"Psychological Indicators of Innovation Adoption: Cross-Classification Based Need for Cognition and Need for Change","volume":"12","author":"Wood","year":"2002","journal-title":"J. Consum. Psychol."},{"key":"ref_11","doi-asserted-by":"crossref","first-page":"201","DOI":"10.1016\/0165-1765(81)90067-7","article-title":"Some Empirical Evidence on Dynamic Inconsistency","volume":"8","author":"Thaler","year":"1981","journal-title":"Econ. Lett."},{"key":"ref_12","unstructured":"Loewenstein, G., and Elster, J. (1992). Choice over Time, Russell Sage Foundation."},{"key":"ref_13","doi-asserted-by":"crossref","first-page":"715","DOI":"10.3758\/BF03211314","article-title":"Rate of Temporal Discounting Decreases with Amount of Reward","volume":"25","author":"Green","year":"1997","journal-title":"Memory Cognit."},{"key":"ref_14","unstructured":"Blackwell, D. (1949). The Noisy Duel, One Bullet Each, Arbitrary Accuracy, The RAND Corporation. Technical Report; D-442."},{"key":"ref_15","doi-asserted-by":"crossref","unstructured":"Radzik, T. (1996). Results and Problems in Games of Timing, Institute of Mathematical Statistics. Lecture Notes-Monograph Series, Statistics, Probability and Game Theory: Papers in Honor of David Blackwell.","DOI":"10.1214\/lnms\/1215453577"},{"key":"ref_16","doi-asserted-by":"crossref","first-page":"395","DOI":"10.2307\/2297153","article-title":"On the Diffusion of New Technology: A Game Theoretic Approach","volume":"48","author":"Reinganum","year":"1981","journal-title":"Rev. Econ. Stud."},{"key":"ref_17","doi-asserted-by":"crossref","first-page":"663","DOI":"10.2307\/2526827","article-title":"The War of Attrition in Continuous Time with Complete Information","volume":"29","author":"Hendricks","year":"1988","journal-title":"Int. Econ. Rev."},{"key":"ref_18","doi-asserted-by":"crossref","first-page":"532","DOI":"10.1016\/j.geb.2009.09.005","article-title":"Clock Games: Theory and Experiments","volume":"68","author":"Brunnermeier","year":"2010","journal-title":"Games Econ. Behav."},{"key":"ref_19","unstructured":"Gallice, A. (2008). Preempting versus Postponing: The Stealing Game, International Centre for Economic Research. Technical Report, ICER Working Papers 02-2008."},{"key":"ref_20","doi-asserted-by":"crossref","first-page":"597","DOI":"10.1016\/j.cose.2011.12.010","article-title":"Leveraging Behavioral Science to Mitigate Cyber Security Risk","volume":"31","author":"Caputo","year":"2012","journal-title":"Comput. Secur."},{"key":"ref_21","doi-asserted-by":"crossref","first-page":"2206","DOI":"10.1016\/j.comnet.2012.11.023","article-title":"Understanding and Overcoming Cyber Security Anti-Patterns","volume":"57","author":"Julisch","year":"2013","journal-title":"Comput. Networks"},{"key":"ref_22","doi-asserted-by":"crossref","first-page":"517","DOI":"10.1007\/s10669-013-9473-2","article-title":"Heuristics and Biases in Cyber Security Dilemmas","volume":"33","author":"Rosoff","year":"2013","journal-title":"Environ. Syst. Decis."},{"key":"ref_23","first-page":"86","article-title":"Cognitive Biases Potentially Affecting Judgment of Global Risks","volume":"1","author":"Yudkowsky","year":"2008","journal-title":"Glob. Catastrophic Risks"},{"key":"ref_24","doi-asserted-by":"crossref","unstructured":"Pham, V., and Cid, C. (2012, January 5\u20136). Are We Compromised? Modelling Security Assessment Games. Proceedings of the Third Conference on Decision and Game Theory for Security (GameSec), Budapest, Hungary.","DOI":"10.1007\/978-3-642-34266-0_14"},{"key":"ref_25","doi-asserted-by":"crossref","unstructured":"Laszka, A., Horvath, G., Felegyhazi, M., and Buttyan, L. (2014). FlipThem: Modeling Targeted Attacks with FlipIt for Multiple Resources. Decision and Game Theory for Security, Springer.","DOI":"10.1007\/978-3-319-12601-2_10"},{"key":"ref_26","unstructured":"Nochenson, A., and Grossklags, J. (2013, January 11\u201312). A Behavioral Investigation of the FlipIt Game. Proceedings of the 12th Workshop on the Economics of Information Security (WEIS), Washington, DC, USA."},{"key":"ref_27","unstructured":"Ghafurian, M., and Reitter, D. (2014, January 23\u201326). Impatience, Risk Propensity and Rationality in Timing Games. Proceedings of the 36th Annual Conference of the Cognitive Science Society (CogSci), Quebec City, QC, Canada."},{"key":"ref_28","first-page":"43","article-title":"Critical Decision Making Under Pressure","volume":"3","author":"Leland","year":"2009","journal-title":"Homel. Secur. Rev."},{"key":"ref_29","doi-asserted-by":"crossref","first-page":"56","DOI":"10.1109\/TSMCC.2005.860575","article-title":"Software Agents and Market (In)Efficiency\u2014A Human Trader Experiment","volume":"36","author":"Grossklags","year":"2006","journal-title":"IEEE Trans. Syst. Man, Cybern. Part C"},{"key":"ref_30","doi-asserted-by":"crossref","first-page":"399","DOI":"10.1007\/s10683-011-9273-9","article-title":"The Online Laboratory: Conducting Experiments in a Real Labor Market","volume":"14","author":"Horton","year":"2011","journal-title":"Exp. Econ."},{"key":"ref_31","doi-asserted-by":"crossref","first-page":"7","DOI":"10.1016\/0010-0277(94)90018-3","article-title":"Insensitivity to Future Consequences Following Damage to Human Prefrontal Cortex","volume":"50","author":"Bechara","year":"1994","journal-title":"Cognition"},{"key":"ref_32","doi-asserted-by":"crossref","first-page":"109","DOI":"10.1080\/00461520.1998.9653294","article-title":"Reconceptualizing Change in the Cognitive Construction of Knowledge","volume":"33","author":"Dole","year":"1998","journal-title":"Educ. Psychol."},{"key":"ref_33","unstructured":"Leary, M., and Hoyle, R. (2009). Chapter 21. The Need for Cognition. Handbook of Individual Differences in Social Behavior, The Guildford Press."},{"key":"ref_34","doi-asserted-by":"crossref","first-page":"3527","DOI":"10.1002\/sim.1572","article-title":"Measuring Explained Variation in Linear Mixed Effects Models","volume":"22","author":"Xu","year":"2003","journal-title":"Stat. Med."},{"key":"ref_35","doi-asserted-by":"crossref","first-page":"19","DOI":"10.1016\/S0165-4896(00)00055-X","article-title":"Learning to Make Risk Neutral Choices in a Symmetric World","volume":"41","author":"DellaVigna","year":"2001","journal-title":"Math. Soc. Sci."}],"container-title":["Games"],"original-title":[],"language":"en","link":[{"URL":"https:\/\/www.mdpi.com\/2073-4336\/10\/4\/49\/pdf","content-type":"unspecified","content-version":"vor","intended-application":"similarity-checking"}],"deposited":{"date-parts":[[2025,10,11]],"date-time":"2025-10-11T13:42:50Z","timestamp":1760190170000},"score":1,"resource":{"primary":{"URL":"https:\/\/www.mdpi.com\/2073-4336\/10\/4\/49"}},"subtitle":[],"short-title":[],"issued":{"date-parts":[[2019,12,16]]},"references-count":35,"journal-issue":{"issue":"4","published-online":{"date-parts":[[2019,12]]}},"alternative-id":["g10040049"],"URL":"https:\/\/doi.org\/10.3390\/g10040049","relation":{},"ISSN":["2073-4336"],"issn-type":[{"value":"2073-4336","type":"electronic"}],"subject":[],"published":{"date-parts":[[2019,12,16]]}}}