Peter Ayton
Biographic Data
| ID | 1661747 |
|---|---|
| NAME | Peter Ayton |
| GIVEN NAMES | Peter |
| FAMILY NAME | Ayton |
| SIGNATURE | AYTON P |
| AFFILIATIONS | City, University of London |
| ORCID | 0000-0003-2285-4608 |
| VERIFIED | Yes |
| TOTAL WORKS | 17 |
| TOTAL CITATIONS | 50 |
| AUTHOR COUNT | 17 |
| EDITOR COUNT | 0 |
| FIRST PUBLICATION YEAR | 1986 |
| LATEST PUBLICATION YEAR | 2025 |
| H-INDEX | 3 |
Risk and the regulatory challenges of smart consumer products
When harm occurs—a normal accident? Psychological harm—an elusive concept Summary and conclusion Disclosure statement References Full Article Figures & data References Citations Metrics Reprints & Permissions View PDF(open in a new window)View EPUB(open in a new window) Previous article View latest articles Next article Osman’s (Citation2025) consideration of psychological harm and its applications to consumer products with internet connectivity …
When Vegas Comes to Wall Street: Associations Between Stock Price Volatility and Trading Frequency Amongst Gamblers
Both gambling and trading involve risk-taking in exchange for potential financial gains. In particular, speculative high-risk high-frequency trading closely resembles disordered gambling behaviour by attracting the same individuals who tend to be overconfident, sensation-seekers, and attracted to quick large potential payoffs. We build on these studies via an incentivised experiment, in which we examine how manipulated levels of market volatility…
Managing uncertainty: Psychological issues are critical for risk policy
The target article ‘Risk analysis, uncertainty and innovation: what does this mean for the Dutch energy transition?’ advocates dropping use of the precautionary principle, proposing an alternative Tolerability of Risk (ToR) approach to foster both protection and innovation in the face of uncertain risks. Inclusion of stakeholder views and values is a key feature of ToR with fundamental appeal. However the status of public perceptions of risk is c…
Differences Amongst Estimates of the UK Problem Gambling Prevalence Rate Are Partly Due to a Methodological Artefact
Smoking versus vaping: How (not) to communicate their relative harms
Here we consider how the relative harms of two nicotine products were communicated in a public health campaign. Following a peer-reviewed evaluation that rated the relative harm of a range of nicotine products relative to the harm of smoking, and which rated the relative harm of vaping as about 5% that of smoking (D. J. Nutt et al., 2014 Nutt, D. J., L. D. Phillips, D. Balfour, H. V. Curran, M. Dockrell, J. Foulds, K. Fagerstrom, et al. 2014. “Es…
The impact of life experiences on risk taking
Evidence based uncertainty: What is needed now
This short commentary is a response to recent published work by the European Food Safety Authority (EFSA). EFSA is an independent regulatory body that provides scientific evidence to decision-makers in order to advise on what constitutes food safety in Europe. As a consequence, they set the tone for the conceptualisation of risk and uncertainty for those involved throughout the entire risk analysis process, as well as all the stake holders involv…
Bailing and jailing the fast and frugal way
Legal decisions such as the decision to bail upon adjourning a case have major consequences for both defendants and society. In the English system, magistrates, most of whom are lay people, are afforded considerable discretion and must work under constraints such as time pressure. Judgment analysis of the bail decision making policies of 81 magistrates from 44 courts throughout England and Wales revealed intra- and inter-magistrate inconsistency …
Bailing and jailing the fast and frugal way
Legal decisions such as the decision to bail upon adjourning a case have major consequences for both defendants and society. In the English system, magistrates, most of whom are lay people, are afforded considerable discretion and must work under constraints such as time pressure. Judgment analysis of the bail decision making policies of 81 magistrates from 44 courts throughout England and Wales revealed intra‐ and inter‐magistrate inconsistency …
Should NDM change our understanding of decision making
What sort of activity should we understand to be encompassed by the term decision making? As laid out by Lipshitz et al. (this issue), the Naturalistic Decision Making (NDM) framework offers a view of human decision making that stems not from the familiar economic/mathematical theoretical tradition of nonnative decision theory but from practical attempts to understand, and, moreover, train and improve, experts in action. The requirements of this …
The sunk cost and Concorde effects: Are humans less rational than lower animals
The cost effect is a maladaptive economic behavior that is manifested in a greater tendency to continue an endeavor once an investment in money, effort, or time has been made. The Concorde fallacy is another name for the cost effect, except that the former term has been applied strictly to lower animals, whereas the latter has been applied solely to humans. The authors contend that there are no unambiguous instances of the Concorde fallacy in low…
How Real is Overconfidence
How Real is Overconfidence
Commentaries on ‘psychological conceptions of randomness’
Randomness and reality
Psychological conceptions of randomness
This article presents a critique of the concept of randomness as it occurs in the psychological literature. The first section of our article outlines the significance of a concept of randomness to the process of induction; we need to distinguish random and non‐random events in order to perceive lawful regularities and formulate theories concerning events in the world. Next we evaluate the psychological research that has suggested that human conce…
The psychology of forecasting
The sunk cost and Concorde effects: Are humans less rational than lower animals
The cost effect is a maladaptive economic behavior that is manifested in a greater tendency to continue an endeavor once an investment in money, effort, or time has been made. The Concorde fallacy is another name for the cost effect, except that the former term has been applied strictly to lower animals, whereas the latter has been applied solely to humans. The authors contend that there are no unambiguous instances of the Concorde fallacy in low…
Bailing and jailing the fast and frugal way
Legal decisions such as the decision to bail upon adjourning a case have major consequences for both defendants and society. In the English system, magistrates, most of whom are lay people, are afforded considerable discretion and must work under constraints such as time pressure. Judgment analysis of the bail decision making policies of 81 magistrates from 44 courts throughout England and Wales revealed intra‐ and inter‐magistrate inconsistency …
Psychological conceptions of randomness
This article presents a critique of the concept of randomness as it occurs in the psychological literature. The first section of our article outlines the significance of a concept of randomness to the process of induction; we need to distinguish random and non‐random events in order to perceive lawful regularities and formulate theories concerning events in the world. Next we evaluate the psychological research that has suggested that human conce…
Evidence based uncertainty: What is needed now
This short commentary is a response to recent published work by the European Food Safety Authority (EFSA). EFSA is an independent regulatory body that provides scientific evidence to decision-makers in order to advise on what constitutes food safety in Europe. As a consequence, they set the tone for the conceptualisation of risk and uncertainty for those involved throughout the entire risk analysis process, as well as all the stake holders involv…
Commentaries on ‘psychological conceptions of randomness’
The psychology of forecasting
Psychological conceptions of randomness
This article presents a critique of the concept of randomness as it occurs in the psychological literature. The first section of our article outlines the significance of a concept of randomness to the process of induction; we need to distinguish random and non‐random events in order to perceive lawful regularities and formulate theories concerning events in the world. Next we evaluate the psychological research that has suggested that human conce…
Commentaries on ‘psychological conceptions of randomness’
Randomness and reality
How Real is Overconfidence
How Real is Overconfidence
The sunk cost and Concorde effects: Are humans less rational than lower animals
The cost effect is a maladaptive economic behavior that is manifested in a greater tendency to continue an endeavor once an investment in money, effort, or time has been made. The Concorde fallacy is another name for the cost effect, except that the former term has been applied strictly to lower animals, whereas the latter has been applied solely to humans. The authors contend that there are no unambiguous instances of the Concorde fallacy in low…
Bailing and jailing the fast and frugal way
Legal decisions such as the decision to bail upon adjourning a case have major consequences for both defendants and society. In the English system, magistrates, most of whom are lay people, are afforded considerable discretion and must work under constraints such as time pressure. Judgment analysis of the bail decision making policies of 81 magistrates from 44 courts throughout England and Wales revealed intra- and inter-magistrate inconsistency …
Bailing and jailing the fast and frugal way
Legal decisions such as the decision to bail upon adjourning a case have major consequences for both defendants and society. In the English system, magistrates, most of whom are lay people, are afforded considerable discretion and must work under constraints such as time pressure. Judgment analysis of the bail decision making policies of 81 magistrates from 44 courts throughout England and Wales revealed intra‐ and inter‐magistrate inconsistency …
Should NDM change our understanding of decision making
What sort of activity should we understand to be encompassed by the term decision making? As laid out by Lipshitz et al. (this issue), the Naturalistic Decision Making (NDM) framework offers a view of human decision making that stems not from the familiar economic/mathematical theoretical tradition of nonnative decision theory but from practical attempts to understand, and, moreover, train and improve, experts in action. The requirements of this …
Evidence based uncertainty: What is needed now
This short commentary is a response to recent published work by the European Food Safety Authority (EFSA). EFSA is an independent regulatory body that provides scientific evidence to decision-makers in order to advise on what constitutes food safety in Europe. As a consequence, they set the tone for the conceptualisation of risk and uncertainty for those involved throughout the entire risk analysis process, as well as all the stake holders involv…
Smoking versus vaping: How (not) to communicate their relative harms
Here we consider how the relative harms of two nicotine products were communicated in a public health campaign. Following a peer-reviewed evaluation that rated the relative harm of a range of nicotine products relative to the harm of smoking, and which rated the relative harm of vaping as about 5% that of smoking (D. J. Nutt et al., 2014 Nutt, D. J., L. D. Phillips, D. Balfour, H. V. Curran, M. Dockrell, J. Foulds, K. Fagerstrom, et al. 2014. “Es…
The impact of life experiences on risk taking
Differences Amongst Estimates of the UK Problem Gambling Prevalence Rate Are Partly Due to a Methodological Artefact
When Vegas Comes to Wall Street: Associations Between Stock Price Volatility and Trading Frequency Amongst Gamblers
Both gambling and trading involve risk-taking in exchange for potential financial gains. In particular, speculative high-risk high-frequency trading closely resembles disordered gambling behaviour by attracting the same individuals who tend to be overconfident, sensation-seekers, and attracted to quick large potential payoffs. We build on these studies via an incentivised experiment, in which we examine how manipulated levels of market volatility…
Managing uncertainty: Psychological issues are critical for risk policy
The target article ‘Risk analysis, uncertainty and innovation: what does this mean for the Dutch energy transition?’ advocates dropping use of the precautionary principle, proposing an alternative Tolerability of Risk (ToR) approach to foster both protection and innovation in the face of uncertain risks. Inclusion of stakeholder views and values is a key feature of ToR with fundamental appeal. However the status of public perceptions of risk is c…
Risk and the regulatory challenges of smart consumer products
When harm occurs—a normal accident? Psychological harm—an elusive concept Summary and conclusion Disclosure statement References Full Article Figures & data References Citations Metrics Reprints & Permissions View PDF(open in a new window)View EPUB(open in a new window) Previous article View latest articles Next article Osman’s (Citation2025) consideration of psychological harm and its applications to consumer products with internet connectivity …
Psychology (14 works) · Computer Science (10 works) · Decision-Making and Behavioral Economics (10 works) · Sociology (8 works) · Social Psychology (6 works) · Social Psychology (6 works) · Economics (5 works) · Library science (5 works) · Citation (4 works) · Business (3 works)