Cost–benefit reasoning in students with multiple secondary school suspensions

Twenty-seven high-school students whose careers had been characterized by multiple school suspensions were compared to a control group on a cost–benefit reasoning task developed by Bechara, Damasio, Damasio, and Anderson (1994) as a laboratory probe for the study of the problems in behavioral regulation. Like some clinical populations that have been studied with this task, the adolescents with multiple school suspensions failed to maximize their earnings in the task because they were not deterred from options with high penalties. This group displayed less optimal behavior in the cost–benefit reasoning task despite having measured intelligence that was equal to that of the controls. The results are consistent with the notion that these students lack adequate somatic markers in an automatic goal orientation system.