A new study published in the journal PLOS Computational Biology shows that successful decision making can be measured by fluctuations in the size of a person's pupil.

Researchers from Leiden University said that when a person has a larger pupil size he tends to have poorer and inconsistent decisions.

Like Us on Facebook

To develop this study, researchers measured the pupil size of 26 individuals who had to answer visual choice tasks based on perceptual decisions that people encounter in their everyday lives.

They measured pupil sizes before they made the subjects perform tasks and monitored the change in pupil size while they are deciding.

Researchers combined the results using a simple mathematical model that describes how people make decisions.

Their results showed that pupil sizes are a good indication on the responsiveness of a person even though few researchers in the past couldn't understand how pupil size related to reliable perceptual judgment.

Researchers found out that pupil size is a determinant of the decision making of people about the world around them,

They said that larger pupil size indicates increased responsiveness. They also found out that when a person is hyper-responsive, their decision making abilities becomes poor, leading to undesirable results.

Peter Murphy, one of the researchers, said people are constantly required to make decisions in the world they live in.

He said their findings suggest the reliability of an individual can be determined by their pupil arousal and alertness, which can be deciphered in a fly.

He explained that this new information could be valuable for further research that aims to enhance the perceptual decision making of individual.