Process tracing methods in decision making: on growing up in the 70ties

Decision research has experienced a shift from simple algebraic theories of choices to an appreciation of mental processes that precede and produce those choices. An important development has been an increasing number and variety of process-tracing methods that can help verifying these assumed process explanations. Here, we provide a comprehensive yet concise survey of these methods, including specific examples for verbal protocols, information boards, eye-tracking and mousetracking tools to illustrate their research value and contributions to theory building and testing. We show how these techniques can inform phenomena as varied as attention, emotion, strategy use, and developing intentions. Two important future developments are identified: broadening the number of explicit tests of proposed processes through formal modeling and defining standards and best-practices for data collection.