The Psychology of Human Risk Preferences and Vulnerability to Scare-Mongers: Experimental Economic Tools for Hypothesis Formulation and Testing
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Department of Philosophy, University College Cork 2–4 Elderwood, College Road, Cork Ireland School of Economics, University of Cape Town Private Bag, Rondebosch 7701 South Africa Center for the Economic Analysis of Risk, J. Mack Robinson College of Business, Georgia State University 35 Broad Street nw, Atlanta, ga 30303 USA
Search for other papers by Don Ross in
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The Internet and social media have opened niches for political exploitation of human dispositions to hyper-alarmed states that amplify perceived threats relative to their objective probabilities of occurrence. Researchers should aim to observe the dynamic “ramping up” of security threat mechanisms under controlled experimental conditions. Such research necessarily begins from a clear model of standard baseline states, and should involve adding treatments to established experimental protocols developed by experimental economists. We review these protocols, which allow for joint estimation of risk preferences and subjective beliefs about probabilities and their distributions. Results we have obtained on such estimates, from populations in various countries, are gathered for comparison. Most people show moderate risk aversion in non-alarmed states. We also find universal heterogeneity in risk preference structures, with substantial sub-samples weighting probabilities in such a way as to display “probability pessimism” (rank dependent utility), while others make risky choices in accordance with expected utility theory.
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| All Time | Past Year | Past 30 Days | |
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| Abstract Views | 344 | 54 | 7 |
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The Psychology of Human Risk Preferences and Vulnerability to Scare-Mongers: Experimental Economic Tools for Hypothesis Formulation and Testing
In: Journal of Cognition and CultureSearch for other papers by Glenn W. Harrison in
Current site
Google Scholar
PubMed
Department of Philosophy, University College Cork 2–4 Elderwood, College Road, Cork Ireland School of Economics, University of Cape Town Private Bag, Rondebosch 7701 South Africa Center for the Economic Analysis of Risk, J. Mack Robinson College of Business, Georgia State University 35 Broad Street nw, Atlanta, ga 30303 USA
Search for other papers by Don Ross in
Current site
Google Scholar
PubMed
The Internet and social media have opened niches for political exploitation of human dispositions to hyper-alarmed states that amplify perceived threats relative to their objective probabilities of occurrence. Researchers should aim to observe the dynamic “ramping up” of security threat mechanisms under controlled experimental conditions. Such research necessarily begins from a clear model of standard baseline states, and should involve adding treatments to established experimental protocols developed by experimental economists. We review these protocols, which allow for joint estimation of risk preferences and subjective beliefs about probabilities and their distributions. Results we have obtained on such estimates, from populations in various countries, are gathered for comparison. Most people show moderate risk aversion in non-alarmed states. We also find universal heterogeneity in risk preference structures, with substantial sub-samples weighting probabilities in such a way as to display “probability pessimism” (rank dependent utility), while others make risky choices in accordance with expected utility theory.
| All Time | Past Year | Past 30 Days | |
|---|---|---|---|
| Abstract Views | 344 | 54 | 7 |
| Full Text Views | 216 | 5 | 1 |
| PDF Views & Downloads | 44 | 11 | 4 |