Risk perceptions

Question 1

what is the availability heuristic?

Answer 1

overestimating frequency of vivid or easily recalled events i.e) fear of flying vs. fear of travelling in car

Question 2

what is representativeness heuristic?

Answer 2

if something is similar to things in a certain category it also belongs in that category i.e) judging a person by who they are friends with

Question 3

what is omission bias?

Answer 3

avoid taking action that has potential side effects, accepting risk associated with doing nothing - i.e) parent not vaccinating child

Question 4

what is unrealistic optimism/optimistic bias?

Answer 4

some behaviour is more risky for others than for myself -

Question 5

what are the 3 major forms of risk communicatio?

Answer 5

1) single event probabilites - “first heart transplant was given 80% chance of survival”
2) conditional probabilites - if a woman has breast cancer, the probability that she will test positive on a screening mammogram is 90%
3) relative risk - people with high cholesterol can rapidly reduce their risk of death by 22% by taking…”

Question 6

what is absolute risk reduction, relative risk reduction and number needed to treat?

Answer 6

absolute risk reduction = the actual risk reduction - the unimpressive number

relative risk reduction = absolute risk divided by the number to who die without treamtnet - prefered by media/drug companies

NNT = the number of people who need to be treated to save 1 life