We commonly think of information as a means to an end. However, a growing theoretical and experimental literature suggests that information may directly enter the agent's utility function. This can create an incentive to avoid information, even when it is useful, free, and independent of...

We propose and experimentally test a new theory of information seeking and avoidance. Beyond the conventional desire for information as an input to decision making, people are driven by curiosity, which is a desire to fill information gaps, even in the absence of material benefits. People are...