TY - JOUR
T1 - When Dread Risks Are More Dreadful than Continuous Risks
T2 - Comparing Cumulative Population Losses over Time
AU - Bodemer, Nicolai
AU - Ruggeri, Azzurra
AU - Galesic, Mirta
PY - 2013/6/26
Y1 - 2013/6/26
N2 - People show higher sensitivity to dread risks, rare events that kill many people at once, compared with continuous risks, relatively frequent events that kill many people over a longer period of time. The different reaction to dread risks is often considered a bias: If the continuous risk causes the same number of fatalities, it should not be perceived as less dreadful. We test the hypothesis that a dread risk may have a stronger negative impact on the cumulative population size over time in comparison with a continuous risk causing the same number of fatalities. This difference should be particularly strong when the risky event affects children and young adults who would have produced future offspring if they had survived longer. We conducted a series of simulations, with varying assumptions about population size, population growth, age group affected by risky event, and the underlying demographic model. Results show that dread risks affect the population more severely over time than continuous risks that cause the same number of fatalities, suggesting that fearing a dread risk more than a continuous risk is an ecologically rational strategy.
AB - People show higher sensitivity to dread risks, rare events that kill many people at once, compared with continuous risks, relatively frequent events that kill many people over a longer period of time. The different reaction to dread risks is often considered a bias: If the continuous risk causes the same number of fatalities, it should not be perceived as less dreadful. We test the hypothesis that a dread risk may have a stronger negative impact on the cumulative population size over time in comparison with a continuous risk causing the same number of fatalities. This difference should be particularly strong when the risky event affects children and young adults who would have produced future offspring if they had survived longer. We conducted a series of simulations, with varying assumptions about population size, population growth, age group affected by risky event, and the underlying demographic model. Results show that dread risks affect the population more severely over time than continuous risks that cause the same number of fatalities, suggesting that fearing a dread risk more than a continuous risk is an ecologically rational strategy.
UR - http://www.scopus.com/inward/record.url?scp=84879478728&partnerID=8YFLogxK
U2 - 10.1371/journal.pone.0066544
DO - 10.1371/journal.pone.0066544
M3 - Article
C2 - 23840503
AN - SCOPUS:84879478728
SN - 1932-6203
VL - 8
JO - PLoS ONE
JF - PLoS ONE
IS - 6
M1 - e66544
ER -