Effects of probabilities, adverse outcomes, and status quo on perceived riskiness of medications: Testing explanatory hypotheses concerning gist, worry, and numeracy

• Published in: Applied cognitive psychology Vol. 32; no. 6; pp. 714 - 726
• Main Authors: Wilhelms, Evan A., Fraenkel, Liana, Reyna, Valerie F.
• Format: Journal Article
• Language: English
• Published: England Wiley 01.11.2018; Wiley Subscription Services, Inc
• Subjects: Adults; Attitudes; Between-subjects design; Cancer; Clinical information; Cognition; Critical incidents; Diseases; Drug Therapy; Drugs; Emotional Response; Emotions; Experiments; fuzzy‐trace theory; gist; Health; Health status; Integrative approach; Numeracy; Pneumonia; Probability; Risk; risk communication; Risk perception; side effects; Worry; side effects; gist; numeracy; fuzzy-trace theory; risk communication
• ISSN: 0888-4080; 1099-0720
• DOI: 10.1002/acp.3448

We tested predictions of fuzzy‐trace theory that qualitative health status and gist representations (ordinal and categorical) of risks contribute to willingness to start medications, beyond effects of objective risk, emotion (worry), and numeracy. Adults in two experiments were given hypothetical scenarios based on actual medications, varying health status quo (acceptable or unacceptable), adverse event (pneumonia or cancer), and four levels of quantitative risk (from 1/100,000 to 1/100) between subjects. In both experiments, cancer and higher quantitative risk elicited greater worry and risk perceptions and reduced willingness to start a new medication. Willingness to start was also influenced by health status quo. After controlling for other variables, only status quo and gist representations consistently predicted willingness to start in both experiments. Results support an integrated approach to understanding and predicting perceptions of the risks of medications that encompasses numerical cognition, emotions (such as worry), and qualitative gist representations of medical information.