Ellen Peters
Biographic Data
| ID | 3596598 |
|---|---|
| NAME | Ellen Peters |
| GIVEN NAMES | Ellen |
| FAMILY NAME | Peters |
| SIGNATURE | PETERS E |
| AFFILIATIONS | The Ohio State University |
| ORCID | 0000-0003-0702-6169 |
| VERIFIED | Yes |
| TOTAL WORKS | 48 |
| TOTAL CITATIONS | 406 |
| AUTHOR COUNT | 48 |
| EDITOR COUNT | 0 |
| FIRST PUBLICATION YEAR | 1996 |
| LATEST PUBLICATION YEAR | 2025 |
| H-INDEX | 9 |
Examining the interplay of risk and affect over time
The power of numbers in natural hazard communication
Size Does Not Matter: Numeracy and the Effect of Quantity Information on Consumers' Price Judgments
A product's printed quantity information (e.g., 12 oz) is thought to provide meaningful information for product evaluations. However, previous research suggests that consumers often do not weigh this information. It remains unclear whether some people, in fact, do weigh the information and what factors (e.g., package design) might increase or decrease such a consideration. In one lab experiment and one eye‐tracking experiment, we examined the inf…
What drives parents’ use of air quality indexes during wildfire smoke events: Predictors of index knowledge, frequent checking, and following health guidance
Wildfire smoke poses a serious and growing health threat to communities in the United States (US), Canada, and beyond. Some populations—including children—are especially susceptible. Air Quality Indexes (AQIs) can inform parents about local air quality during smoke events and offer guidance on actions that protect children. In July–August 2023, parents from Oregon, Washington, California, and British Columbia (BC) ( n = 2100) participated in an o…
NIH indirect cost cuts will affect the economy and employment
Clearing the air: Evaluating institutions’ social media health messaging on wildfire and smoke risks in the US Pacific Northwest
This research provides practical recommendations for public health practitioners and researchers communicating wildfire smoke risks on social media. As exposures to wildfire smoke rise due to climate change, reducing the environmental disease burden requires health officials to leverage popular communication platforms, distribute necessary health-related messaging rapidly, and get the message right. Timely, evidence-based, and theory-driven messa…
Numeracy Matters: Response to “Do the Math” By Joachim I. Krueger
Predicting Future Utilization Using Self-Reported Health and Health Conditions in a Longitudinal Cohort Study: Implications for Health Insurance Decision Support
Decision support techniques and online algorithms aim to help individuals predict costs and facilitate their choice of health insurance coverage. Self-reported health status (SHS), whereby patients rate their own health, could improve cost-prediction estimates without requiring individuals to share personal health information or know about undiagnosed conditions. We compared the predictive accuracy of several models: (1) SHS only, (2) a "basic" m…
Numeracy, numeric attention, and number use in judgment and choice
People higher (vs. lower) in objective numeracy—the ability to use probabilistic and mathematical concepts—use numeric information more when making decisions. Specifically, they are more sensitive to numeric levels than the less numerate and use more numeric versus nonnumeric information. Greater attention to numbers may explain this effect, but little is known about objective numeracy's relation to numeric attention and possible subsequent effec…
Using social and behavioural science to support Covid-19 pandemic response
The COVID-19 pandemic represents a massive global health crisis. Because the crisis requires large-scale behaviour change and places significant psychological burdens on individuals, insights from the social and behavioural sciences can be used to help align human behavior with the recommendations of epidemiologists and public health experts. Here we discuss evidence from a selection of research topics relevant to pandemics, including work on nav…
Explaining the Education-Health Gradient in Preventing STIs in Andean Peru: Cognitive Executive Functioning, Awareness and Health Knowledge
CONTEXT: Little is known about the pathways mediating the relationship between education and health. It is widely assumed that formal schooling leads to awareness of health risks (e.g., STIs) and, in turn, to adoption of preventive behavior (e.g., condom use); however, evidence supporting this mechanism has been limited. METHODS: Survey data were collected in 2010 from a sample of 247 adults aged 30-62 living in an isolated Andean district of Per…
Using social and behavioural science to support Covid-19 pandemic response
Communicating about chemicals in cigarette smoke: Impact on knowledge and misunderstanding
Knowledge of chemicals and health effects can increase after viewing a website. Yet, websites may not correct the misunderstanding that some cigarettes are safer
The loss‐bet paradox: Actuaries, accountants, and other numerate people rate numerically inferior gambles as superior
Psychologists have convincingly demonstrated that preferences are not always stable and, instead, are often "constructed" based on information available in the judgment or decision context. In 4 studies with experts (accountants and actuaries in Studies 1 and 2, respectively) and a diverse lay population (Studies 3 and 4), the evidence was consistent with the highly numerate being more likely than the less numerate to construct their preferences …
Overcoming Innumeracy and the Use of Heuristics When Communicating Science
Science communication is difficult because, rather than understanding and using important, often numeric, information, lay people and experts alike resort to superficial heuristic processing of information. This chapter examines heuristic processing with respect to the power of experience, the affect heuristic, and framing effects along with their interactions with innumeracy. Recommendations are made for how to improve science communication to d…
Educating good decisions
Can we educate decision makers to make better decisions? In the present paper, I argue that we can in at least two broad ways: (1) teaching concrete knowledge about a specific decision or decision type and (2) teaching more abstract decision-making competencies thought to lead to better decisions. Teaching knowledge can be done using decision aids and similar techniques that provide important information about a specific choice (e.g., a medical t…
Motivated numeracy and enlightened self-government
Why does public conflict over societal risks persist in the face of compelling and widely accessible scientific evidence? We conducted an experiment to probe two alternative answers: the ‘science comprehension thesis’ (SCT), which identifies defects in the public's knowledge and reasoning capacities as the source of such controversies; and the ‘identity-protective cognition thesis’ (ICT), which treats cultural conflict as disabling the faculties …
Lower parental numeracy is associated with children being under- and overweight
Compassion Fade: Affect and Charity Are Greatest for a Single Child in Need
Charitable giving in 2013 exceeded $300 billion, but why do we respond to some life-saving causes while ignoring others? In our first two studies, we demonstrated that valuation of lives is associated with affective feelings (self-reported and psychophysiological) and that a decline in compassion may begin with the second endangered life. In Study 3, this fading of compassion was reversed by describing multiple lives in a more unitary fashion. St…
Multiple numeric competencies: When a number is not just a number
A growing body of evidence demonstrates the practical and theoretical importance of numeracy in evaluations and choices involving numeric information, an importance that goes beyond simple accuracy in performing mathematical computations. Numeric competency, however, may be multiply determined, but little research has examined potentially separable influences in evaluations and choice. In the present article, we describe 3 numeric competencies an…
More Is Not Always Better: Intuitions About Effective Public Policy Can Lead to Unintended Consequences
Public policy decisions often appear based on an assumption that providing more options, more information, and greater decision-making autonomy to consumers will produce better outcomes. We examine reasons why this "more-is-better" approach exists based on the psychological literature. Although better outcomes can result from informed consumer choice, we argue that more options, information, and autonomy can also lead to unintended negative conse…
Same numbers, different meanings: How numeracy influences the importance of numbers for pro-social behavior
Beyond Comprehension: The Role of Numeracy in Judgments and Decisions
When making decisions, people must frequently take into account numerical information, but not all individuals have the ability to understand and use numbers. Less numerate individuals comprehend less numerical information; but numeracy goes beyond comprehension, relating systematically to psychological mechanisms. In particular, greater numeracy has been associated with reduced susceptibility to framing effects, less influence of nonnumerical in…
Beyond nudges: Tools of a choice architecture
The polarizing impact of science literacy and numeracy on perceived climate change risks
Using social and behavioural science to support Covid-19 pandemic response
Motivated numeracy and enlightened self-government
Why does public conflict over societal risks persist in the face of compelling and widely accessible scientific evidence? We conducted an experiment to probe two alternative answers: the ‘science comprehension thesis’ (SCT), which identifies defects in the public's knowledge and reasoning capacities as the source of such controversies; and the ‘identity-protective cognition thesis’ (ICT), which treats cultural conflict as disabling the faculties …
Development and Testing of an Abbreviated Numeracy Scale: A Rasch Analysis Approach
Research has demonstrated that individual differences in numeracy may have important consequences for decision making. In the present paper, we develop a shorter, psychometrically improved measure of numeracy-the ability to understand, manipulate, and use numerical information, including probabilities. Across two large independent samples that varied widely in age and educational level, participants completed 18 items from existing numeracy measu…
Affect and decision making: A “hot” topic
The seven papers in this special issue represent the breadth and complexity of approaches to the study of affect in judgment and decision processes. Four papers examine the role of arousal or specific emotions in decision making. The three other papers investigate the impacts of uncertainty, time course, and thinking about mood. We briefly describe four functions of affect in decision making (affect as information, as a spotlight, as a motivator,…
Multiple numeric competencies: When a number is not just a number
A growing body of evidence demonstrates the practical and theoretical importance of numeracy in evaluations and choices involving numeric information, an importance that goes beyond simple accuracy in performing mathematical computations. Numeric competency, however, may be multiply determined, but little research has examined potentially separable influences in evaluations and choice. In the present article, we describe 3 numeric competencies an…
Aging and decision‐making competence: An analysis of comprehension and consistency skills in older versus younger adults considering health‐plan options
Older adults need to maintain strong decision‐making capabilities as they age. However, we know little about how age‐related physical and psychological changes affect older adults' judgment and decision processes. This paper reports the results of research comparing older versus younger adults' performance on evaluation and choice tasks about health‐plan options. In particular, comprehension and consistency in judgments (across separate versus jo…
The affect heuristic and the attractiveness of simple gambles
Prior studies have observed that the attractiveness of playing a simple gamble (7/36 to win $9; otherwise win nothing) is greatly enhanced by introducing a small loss (7/36 win $9; otherwise lose 5¢). The present studies tested and confirmed an explanation of this finding based on the concept of evaluability and the affect heuristic. Evaluators of the “no‐loss” gamble lack a precise feeling for how good $9 is, hence give it little weight in their…
Same numbers, different meanings: How numeracy influences the importance of numbers for pro-social behavior
Associations of Perceived Risk and Worry with Cancer Health-protective Actions: Data from the Health Information National Trends Survey (HINTS)
This study examined the associations of susceptibility, conceptualized as both a cognition (risk) and as affect (worry) and their possible interaction, with cancer screening behaviors. Data for this study were obtained from the 2003 Health Information National Trends Survey (HINTS). Hierarchical regression models assessed the ability of risk, worry and their interaction (after controlling for other important variables) to predict cancer-screening…
The role of affect in the WTA/WTP disparity
Four studies demonstrated robust within‐ and between‐subject differences in willingness‐to‐pay (WTP) and willingness‐to‐accept (WTA) measures of the value of lottery tickets. Buyers and sellers attended to different numerical cues and interpreted the same numbers differently when setting these two kinds of monetary values. Affective influences appeared to guide the valuation process. Buyers with stronger positive feelings about owning a ticket we…
More Is Not Always Better: Intuitions About Effective Public Policy Can Lead to Unintended Consequences
Public policy decisions often appear based on an assumption that providing more options, more information, and greater decision-making autonomy to consumers will produce better outcomes. We examine reasons why this "more-is-better" approach exists based on the psychological literature. Although better outcomes can result from informed consumer choice, we argue that more options, information, and autonomy can also lead to unintended negative conse…
The loss‐bet paradox: Actuaries, accountants, and other numerate people rate numerically inferior gambles as superior
Psychologists have convincingly demonstrated that preferences are not always stable and, instead, are often "constructed" based on information available in the judgment or decision context. In 4 studies with experts (accountants and actuaries in Studies 1 and 2, respectively) and a diverse lay population (Studies 3 and 4), the evidence was consistent with the highly numerate being more likely than the less numerate to construct their preferences …
Numeracy, numeric attention, and number use in judgment and choice
People higher (vs. lower) in objective numeracy—the ability to use probabilistic and mathematical concepts—use numeric information more when making decisions. Specifically, they are more sensitive to numeric levels than the less numerate and use more numeric versus nonnumeric information. Greater attention to numbers may explain this effect, but little is known about objective numeracy's relation to numeric attention and possible subsequent effec…
Lower parental numeracy is associated with children being under- and overweight
Making sense of uncertainty: Advantages and disadvantages of providing an evaluative structure
In many decision contexts, there is uncertainty in the assessed probabilities and expected consequences of different actions. The fundamental goal for information providers is to present uncertainty in a way that is not overly complicated, yet sufficiently detailed to prompt decision-makers to think about the implications of this uncertainty for the decision at hand. In two experiments, we assess the pros and cons of providing an evaluative struc…
Labor Racketeering: The Mafia and the Unions
The labor movement and its members have long suffered from extortion, thievery, and fraud. Corrupt labor officials have used union power to extort money from businesses. Labor racketeering has been a major source of the Cosa Nostra crime families' power and wealth since the 1930s. Nonetheless, combating labor racketeering did not become a federal law enforcement priority until Jimmy Hoffa's assassination in 1975. The U. S. Department of Justice, …
The Role of Affect and Worldviews as Orienting Dispositions in the Perception and Acceptance of Nuclear Power 1
Recent research in risk perception has examined the role of affect and worldviews as orienting dispositions that guide people's decisions about complex and risky topics such as nuclear energy. This study tests and supports the hypothesis that worldviews and affect‐laden imagery are highly predictive of perceptions of risk from nuclear power and support for that technology. Furthermore, affect and worldviews each contribute independently to the pr…
Rational actors or rational fools: Implications of the affect heuristic for behavioral economics
The Affect Heuristic
This chapter introduces a theoretical framework that describes the importance of affect in guiding judgments and decisions. As used here, affect means the specific quality of "goodness" or "badness" (1) experienced as a feeling state (with or without consciousness) and (2) demarcating a positive or negative quality of a stimulus. Affective responses occur rapidly and automatically – note how quickly you sense the feelings associated with the stim…
Aging and decision‐making competence: An analysis of comprehension and consistency skills in older versus younger adults considering health‐plan options
Older adults need to maintain strong decision‐making capabilities as they age. However, we know little about how age‐related physical and psychological changes affect older adults' judgment and decision processes. This paper reports the results of research comparing older versus younger adults' performance on evaluation and choice tasks about health‐plan options. In particular, comprehension and consistency in judgments (across separate versus jo…
The role of affect in the WTA/WTP disparity
Four studies demonstrated robust within‐ and between‐subject differences in willingness‐to‐pay (WTP) and willingness‐to‐accept (WTA) measures of the value of lottery tickets. Buyers and sellers attended to different numerical cues and interpreted the same numbers differently when setting these two kinds of monetary values. Affective influences appeared to guide the valuation process. Buyers with stronger positive feelings about owning a ticket we…
Labor Racketeering: The Mafia and the Unions
The labor movement and its members have long suffered from extortion, thievery, and fraud. Corrupt labor officials have used union power to extort money from businesses. Labor racketeering has been a major source of the Cosa Nostra crime families' power and wealth since the 1930s. Nonetheless, combating labor racketeering did not become a federal law enforcement priority until Jimmy Hoffa's assassination in 1975. The U. S. Department of Justice, …
An Emotion‐Based Model of Risk Perception and Stigma Susceptibility: Cognitive Appraisals of Emotion, Affective Reactivity, Worldviews, and Risk Perceptions in the Generation of Technological Stigma †
A study ( N = 198) was conducted to examine hypotheses derived from an emotion‐based model of stigma responses to radiation sources. A model of stigma susceptibility is proposed in which affective reactions and cognitive worldviews activate predispositions to appraise and experience events in systematic ways that result in the generation of negative emotion, risk perceptions, and stigma responses. Results of structural equation modeling supported…
Risk as Analysis and Risk as Feelings: Some Thoughts about Affect, Reason, Risk, and Rationality
Modern theories in cognitive psychology and neuroscience indicate that there are two fundamental ways in which human beings comprehend risk. The “analytic system” uses algorithms and normative rules, such as probability calculus, formal logic, and risk assessment. It is relatively slow, effortful, and requires conscious control. The “experiential system” is intuitive, fast, mostly automatic, and not very accessible to conscious awareness. The exp…
Affect, risk, and decision making.
Risk is perceived and acted on in 2 fundamental ways. Risk as feelings refers to individuals' fast, instinctive, and intuitive reactions to danger. Risk as analysis brings logic, reason, and scientific deliberation to bear on risk management. Reliance on risk as feelings is described with "the affect heuristic." The authors trace the development of this heuristic across a variety of research paths. The authors also discuss some of the important p…
Numeracy and Decision Making
A series of four studies explored how the ability to comprehend and transform probability numbers relates to performance on judgment and decision tasks. On the surface, the tasks in the four studies appear to be widely different; at a conceptual level, however, they all involve processing numbers and the potential to show an influence of affect. Findings were consistent with highly numerate individuals being more likely to retrieve and use approp…
The Functions of Affect in Health Communications and in the Construction of Health Preferences
We examine potential roles of 4 functions of affect in health communication and the construction of health preferences. The roles of these 4 functions (affect as information, as a spotlight, as a motivator, and as common currency) are illustrated in the area of cancer screening and treatment decision making. We demonstrate that experienced affect influences information processes, judgments, and decisions. We relate the functions to a self-regulat…
Risk Perception and Affect
Humans perceive and act on risk in two fundamental ways. Risk as feelings refers to individuals' instinctive and intuitive reactions to danger. Risk as analysis brings logic, reason, and scientific deliberation to bear on risk management. Reliance on risk as feelings is described as “the affect heuristic.” This article traces the development of this heuristic and discusses some of the important ways that it impacts how people perceive and evaluat…
Affect and decision making: A “hot” topic
The seven papers in this special issue represent the breadth and complexity of approaches to the study of affect in judgment and decision processes. Four papers examine the role of arousal or specific emotions in decision making. The three other papers investigate the impacts of uncertainty, time course, and thinking about mood. We briefly describe four functions of affect in decision making (affect as information, as a spotlight, as a motivator,…
Less Is More in Presenting Quality Information to Consumers
Much effort has been put into improving measures of health care quality. Although early research suggested that consumers made little use of quality reports, most reports were based on nonstandardized measures and were not user friendly. Information presentation approaches, however, will have a significant influence on what information is attended and used. The present research examines whether information presentation methods differentially infl…
The affect heuristic
Numeracy Skill And The Communication, Comprehension, And Use Of Risk-Benefit Information
Current health care policy emphasizes improving health outcomes and the efficacy of health care delivery by supporting informed consumer choices. At the same time, health information often involves uncertainty, and many people may lack the skills and knowledge to process this information, manage their health and health care, and make informed choices. Innumeracy, an element of poor health literacy, is associated with the comprehension and use of …
Adult Age Differences in Dual Information Processes: Implications for the Role of Affective and Deliberative Processes in Older Adults' Decision Making
Age differences in affective/experiential and deliberative processes have important theoretical implications for judgment and decision theory and important pragmatic implications for older-adult decision making. Age-related declines in the efficiency of deliberative processes predict poorer-quality decisions as we age. However, age-related adaptive processes, including motivated selectivity in the use of deliberative capacity, an increased focus …
The affect heuristic and the attractiveness of simple gambles
Prior studies have observed that the attractiveness of playing a simple gamble (7/36 to win $9; otherwise win nothing) is greatly enhanced by introducing a small loss (7/36 win $9; otherwise lose 5¢). The present studies tested and confirmed an explanation of this finding based on the concept of evaluability and the affect heuristic. Evaluators of the “no‐loss” gamble lack a precise feeling for how good $9 is, hence give it little weight in their…
Associations of Perceived Risk and Worry with Cancer Health-protective Actions: Data from the Health Information National Trends Survey (HINTS)
This study examined the associations of susceptibility, conceptualized as both a cognition (risk) and as affect (worry) and their possible interaction, with cancer screening behaviors. Data for this study were obtained from the 2003 Health Information National Trends Survey (HINTS). Hierarchical regression models assessed the ability of risk, worry and their interaction (after controlling for other important variables) to predict cancer-screening…
Making decisions about prescription drugs: A study of doctor–patient communication
Effective communication between doctors and their patients is essential to successful medication choices and treatments. Our interest in this exploratory paper lies in the quality of communication between doctors and patients: what both parties seek to explain and what they commonly understand, what opportunities and what frictions occur as a result of their respective goals, what gaps exist in their knowledge bases, and how information of differ…
Beyond Comprehension: The Role of Numeracy in Judgments and Decisions
When making decisions, people must frequently take into account numerical information, but not all individuals have the ability to understand and use numbers. Less numerate individuals comprehend less numerical information; but numeracy goes beyond comprehension, relating systematically to psychological mechanisms. In particular, greater numeracy has been associated with reduced susceptibility to framing effects, less influence of nonnumerical in…
Beyond nudges: Tools of a choice architecture
The polarizing impact of science literacy and numeracy on perceived climate change risks
Comprehension of Graphs and Tables Depend on the Task: Empirical Evidence from Two Web-Based Studies
Graphs and tables are an effective means of communication. However, relatively little experimental work exists examining differences between various formats in how well people understand provided information. We conducted two web-based experiments with a large, diverse sample to explore the effects of display format on respondents ’ comprehension. We found that comprehension depended on task. Graphs were better for estimating differences; however…
Making sense of uncertainty: Advantages and disadvantages of providing an evaluative structure
In many decision contexts, there is uncertainty in the assessed probabilities and expected consequences of different actions. The fundamental goal for information providers is to present uncertainty in a way that is not overly complicated, yet sufficiently detailed to prompt decision-makers to think about the implications of this uncertainty for the decision at hand. In two experiments, we assess the pros and cons of providing an evaluative struc…
Psychology (40 works) · Social Psychology (26 works) · Computer Science (23 works) · Decision-Making and Behavioral Economics (20 works) · Cognitive psychology (19 works) · Numeracy (14 works) · Medicine (13 works) · Behavioral Health and Interventions (12 works) · Cognition (12 works) · Communication (12 works)