ST4 - Risk Perception and Affect Flashcards
What are the 2 ways to perceive and act on risk?
- Risk as feelings
- Risk as analysis
What is risk as feelings?
Instinctive and intuitive reactions (to danger)
What is risk as analysis?
Logic, reason and scientific deliberation to bear on risk assessment and decision making
What is the affect heuristic?
Relying on risk as feelings / relying on the feeling of ‘affect’
What are the roles of fear and anger in risk as feelings?
Fear amplifies risk estimates, anger attenuates them
What is ‘affect’?
The specific quality of “goodness” or “badness” experienced as a feeling state
What are dual-process theories of thinking?
Theories that state that people apprehend reality / make decisions in two fundamentally different ways (the rapid & automatic system vs. slow & deliberate system)
Which of the processing systems has an affective basis?
The rapid & automatic / experiential system
How do feelings of dread relate to risk perception?
Positive correlation; dreaded things are perceived as more risky, although this is not always true (radiation)
How are risk and benefit correlated across hazardous activities?
Objectively, they are positively correlated (i.e., high-risk activities tend to have greater benefits). However, in the mind of people they are negatively correlated (i.e., high risk is associated with low benefit)
What does the inverse relationship between perceived risk and perceived benefit mean?
People judge risk not only by what they think about it, but also how they feel about it.
What is meant by “imaging the numerator” (Judgements of probability, relative frequency and risk)
People tend to image the numerator and neglect the denominator, and these images convey affects that motivate their choices
Name two examples of “imaging the numerator”
1/10 red beans vs. 7/100 red beans. 20% chance of committing violent act vs. 20/100 like Mr. Jones commit violent acts.
Is “imaging the numerator” consistent with the affect heuristic?
Yes, these images can convey positive or negative affects that motivate choices
What is insensitivity to probability? (Probability neglect)
When the consequences of an action or event carry strong affective meaning, the probability carries too little weight (lotteries, cancer)
