Giving in the Face of Risk

The decision how to share resources with others often needs to be taken under uncertainty on its allocational consequences. Although risk preferences are likely important, existing research is silent about how social and risk preferences interact in such situations. In this paper we provide experimental evidence on this question. In a first experiment givers are not exposed to risk while beneficiaries’ final earnings may be larger or smaller than the allocation itself, depending on the realized state of the world. In a second experiment, risk affects the earnings of givers but not of beneficiaries. We find that individuals’ risk preferences are predictive for giving in both experiments. Increased risk exposure of beneficiaries tends to decrease giving whereas increased risk exposure of givers has no effect. Giving under risk is strongly correlated with giving in the absence of risk. We find limited support for existing models of ex-post and ex-ante fairness. Our results point to the importance of incorporating risk preferences in models of social preferences

Digital engagement methods for earthquake and fire preparedness:a review

Natural or human-made hazards may occur at any time. Although one might assume that individuals plan in advance for such potentially damaging events, the existing literature indicates that most communities remain inadequately prepared. In the past, research in this area has focused on identifying the most effective ways to communicate risk and elicit preparedness by means of public hazard education campaigns and risk communication programmes. Today, web- and mobile-based technologies are offering new and far-reaching means to inform communities on how to prepare for or cope with extreme events, thus significantly contributing to community preparedness. Nonetheless, their practical efficacy in encouraging proactive hazard preparedness behaviours is not yet proven. Building on behaviour change interventions in the health field and looking in particular at earthquakes and fire hazards, the challenging RISK team has reviewed the currently active websites, Web, and mobile applications that provide information about earthquake and home fire preparedness. The review investigates the type of information provided, the modality of delivery, and the presence of behaviour change techniques in their design. The study proves that most of the digital resources focus on a single hazard and fail to provide context-sensitive information that targets specific groups of users. Furthermore, behaviour change techniques are rarely implemented in the design of these applications and their efficacy is rarely systematically evaluated. Recommendations for improving the design of Web- and mobile-based technologies are made so as to increase their effectiveness and uptake for a multi-hazard approach to earthquake and home fire preparedness

Failure to maintain set as a predictor of childhood depression within a children\u27s psychiatric inpatient sample

Despite a wealth of studies in adults and adolescents, only a handful of studies have examined executive function in childhood depression. This study utilized retrospective chart review of a children\u27s psychiatric inpatient program to evaluate executive function via Wisconsin Card Sorting Test (WCST) in 33 children (6–12 years old) with a depressive disorder and 61 age/sex-matched children without a depressive disorder referred for neuropsychological evaluation. WCST categories, perseverative errors, and failure to maintain set errors were examined as potential predictors of depressive disorder diagnosis and self-reported depressive symptoms. After controlling for age, length of hospital stay, and ADHD, failure to maintain set significantly predicted depressive disorder diagnosis. Failure to maintain set was also significantly associated with self-reported depressive symptoms. Current findings provide preliminary evidence to suggest that failure to maintain set may reflect a core deficit of childhood depression. While findings are preliminary, this may have important implications for the diagnosis and treatment of childhood depression