IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/inm/ordeca/v17y2020i1p24-38.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Valuing Sequences of Lives Lost or Saved Over Time: Preference for Uniform Sequences

Author

Listed:
  • Jeffery L. Guyse

    (Technology and Operations Management, College of Business Administration, California State Polytechnic University, Pomona, California 91768)

  • L. Robin Keller

    (Paul Merage School of Business, University of California, Irvine, Irvine, California 92697)

  • Candice H. Huynh

    (Technology and Operations Management, College of Business Administration, California State Polytechnic University, Pomona, California 91768)

Abstract

Policymakers often make decisions involving human-mortality risks and monetary outcomes that span across different time periods and horizons. Many projects or environmental-regulation policies involving risks to life, such as toxic exposures, are experienced over time. The preferences of individuals on lives lost or saved over time should be understood to implement effective policies. Using a within-subject survey design, we investigated our participants’ elicited preferences (in the form of ratings) for sequences of lives saved or lost over time at the participant level. The design of our study allowed us to directly observe the possible preference patterns of negative time discounting or a preference for spreading from the responses. Additionally, we embedded factors associated with three other prevalent anomalies of intertemporal choice (gain/loss asymmetry, short/long asymmetry, and the absolute magnitude effect) into our study for control. We find that our participants exhibit three of the anomalies: preference for spreading, absolute magnitude effect, and short/long-term asymmetry. Furthermore, fitting the data collected, Loewenstein and Prelec’s model for the valuation of sequences of outcomes allowed for a more thorough understanding of the factors influencing the individual participants’ preferences. Based on the results, the standard discounting model does not accurately reflect the value that some people place on sequences of mortality outcomes. Preferences for uniform sequences should be considered in policymaking rather than applying the standard discounting model.

Suggested Citation

  • Jeffery L. Guyse & L. Robin Keller & Candice H. Huynh, 2020. "Valuing Sequences of Lives Lost or Saved Over Time: Preference for Uniform Sequences," Decision Analysis, INFORMS, vol. 17(1), pages 24-38, March.
  • Handle: RePEc:inm:ordeca:v:17:y:2020:i:1:p:24-38
    DOI: 10.1287/deca.2019.0397
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://doi.org/10.1287/deca.2019.0397
    Download Restriction: no

    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.1287/deca.2019.0397?utm_source=ideas
    LibKey link: if access is restricted and if your library uses this service, LibKey will redirect you to where you can use your library subscription to access this item
    ---><---

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Kahneman, Daniel & Ritov, Ilana & Schkade, David A, 1999. "Economic Preferences or Attitude Expressions?: An Analysis of Dollar Responses to Public Issues," Journal of Risk and Uncertainty, Springer, vol. 19(1-3), pages 203-235, December.
    2. Drazen Prelec & George Loewenstein, 1991. "Decision Making Over Time and Under Uncertainty: A Common Approach," Management Science, INFORMS, vol. 37(7), pages 770-786, July.
    3. Matthew Rabin & Ted O'Donoghue, 1999. "Doing It Now or Later," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 89(1), pages 103-124, March.
    4. Loewenstein, George F & Sicherman, Nachum, 1991. "Do Workers Prefer Increasing Wage Profiles?," Journal of Labor Economics, University of Chicago Press, vol. 9(1), pages 67-84, January.
    5. Weber, Bethany J. & Chapman, Gretchen B., 2005. "The combined effects of risk and time on choice: Does uncertainty eliminate the immediacy effect? Does delay eliminate the certainty effect?," Organizational Behavior and Human Decision Processes, Elsevier, vol. 96(2), pages 104-118, March.
    6. Shane Frederick & George Loewenstein, 2008. "Conflicting motives in evaluations of sequences," Journal of Risk and Uncertainty, Springer, vol. 37(2), pages 221-235, December.
    7. Samuel Greenhouse & Seymour Geisser, 1959. "On methods in the analysis of profile data," Psychometrika, Springer;The Psychometric Society, vol. 24(2), pages 95-112, June.
    8. Thaler, Richard, 1981. "Some empirical evidence on dynamic inconsistency," Economics Letters, Elsevier, vol. 8(3), pages 201-207.
    9. Stevenson, Mary Kay, 1992. "The impact of temporal context and risk on the judged value of future outcomes," Organizational Behavior and Human Decision Processes, Elsevier, vol. 52(3), pages 455-491, August.
    10. Daniel Kahneman & Amos Tversky, 2013. "Prospect Theory: An Analysis of Decision Under Risk," World Scientific Book Chapters, in: Leonard C MacLean & William T Ziemba (ed.), HANDBOOK OF THE FUNDAMENTALS OF FINANCIAL DECISION MAKING Part I, chapter 6, pages 99-127, World Scientific Publishing Co. Pte. Ltd..
    11. George Wu, 1999. "Anxiety and Decision Making with Delayed Resolution of Uncertainty," Theory and Decision, Springer, vol. 46(2), pages 159-199, April.
    12. Kirby, Kris N. & Marakovic, Nino N., 1995. "Modeling Myopic Decisions: Evidence for Hyperbolic Delay-Discounting within Subjects and Amounts," Organizational Behavior and Human Decision Processes, Elsevier, vol. 64(1), pages 22-30, October.
    13. Gretchen B. Chapman & Arthur S. Elstein, 1995. "Valuing the Future," Medical Decision Making, , vol. 15(4), pages 373-386, October.
    14. Martin Ahlbrecht & Martin Weber, 1997. "An Empirical Study on Intertemporal Decision Making Under Risk," Management Science, INFORMS, vol. 43(6), pages 813-826, June.
    15. Horowitz, John K & Carson, Richard T, 1990. "Discounting Statistical Lives," Journal of Risk and Uncertainty, Springer, vol. 3(4), pages 403-413, December.
    16. Cropper, Maureen L & Aydede, Sema K & Portney, Paul R, 1992. "Rates of Time Preference for Saving Lives," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 82(2), pages 469-472, May.
    17. Arthur E. Attema & Han Bleichrodt & Olivier L’Haridon & Patrick Peretti-Watel & Valérie Seror, 2018. "Discounting health and money: New evidence using a more robust method," Journal of Risk and Uncertainty, Springer, vol. 56(2), pages 117-140, April.
    18. George F. Loewenstein, 1988. "Frames of Mind in Intertemporal Choice," Management Science, INFORMS, vol. 34(2), pages 200-214, February.
    19. Jeffery L. Guyse & Jay Simon, 2011. "Consistency Among Elicitation Techniques for Intertemporal Choice: A Within-Subjects Investigation of the Anomalies," Decision Analysis, INFORMS, vol. 8(3), pages 233-246, September.
    20. Chapman, Gretchen B., 1996. "Expectations and Preferences for Sequences of Health and Money," Organizational Behavior and Human Decision Processes, Elsevier, vol. 67(1), pages 59-75, July.
    21. Shane Frederick & George Loewenstein & Ted O'Donoghue, 2002. "Time Discounting and Time Preference: A Critical Review," Journal of Economic Literature, American Economic Association, vol. 40(2), pages 351-401, June.
    22. Uri Benzion & Amnon Rapoport & Joseph Yagil, 1989. "Discount Rates Inferred from Decisions: An Experimental Study," Management Science, INFORMS, vol. 35(3), pages 270-284, March.
    23. Guyse, Jeffery L. & Keller, L. Robin & Eppel, Thomas, 2002. "Valuing Environmental Outcomes: Preferences for Constant or Improving Sequences," Organizational Behavior and Human Decision Processes, Elsevier, vol. 87(2), pages 253-277, March.
    24. George Loewenstein & Drazen Prelec, 1992. "Anomalies in Intertemporal Choice: Evidence and an Interpretation," The Quarterly Journal of Economics, President and Fellows of Harvard College, vol. 107(2), pages 573-597.
    25. Schmitt, David R. & Kemper, Theodore D., 1996. "Preference for Different Sequences of Increasing or Decreasing Rewards," Organizational Behavior and Human Decision Processes, Elsevier, vol. 66(1), pages 89-101, April.
    26. Lowenstein, George & Prelec, Drazen, 1991. "Negative Time Preference," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 81(2), pages 347-352, May.
    27. Marjorie K. Shelley, 1993. "Outcome Signs, Question Frames and Discount Rates," Management Science, INFORMS, vol. 39(7), pages 806-815, July.
    28. Frederick, Shane, 2003. "Measuring Intergenerational Time Preference: Are Future Lives Valued Less?," Journal of Risk and Uncertainty, Springer, vol. 26(1), pages 39-53, January.
    29. Paul A. Samuelson, 1937. "A Note on Measurement of Utility," The Review of Economic Studies, Review of Economic Studies Ltd, vol. 4(2), pages 155-161.
    30. Emmett B. Keeler & Shan Cretin, 1983. "Discounting of Life-Saving and Other Nonmonetary Effects," Management Science, INFORMS, vol. 29(3), pages 300-306, March.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Citations

    Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
    as


    Cited by:

    1. Vicki M. Bier, 2021. "From the Editor: 2020 Inaugural Clemen–Kleinmuntz Decision Analysis Best Paper Award," Decision Analysis, INFORMS, vol. 18(4), pages 245-246, December.
    2. Alexander Adamou & Yonatan Berman & Diomides Mavroyiannis & Ole Peters, 2021. "Microfoundations of Discounting," Decision Analysis, INFORMS, vol. 18(4), pages 257-272, December.
    3. Elisa F. Long & Gilberto Montibeller & Jun Zhuang, 2022. "Health Decision Analysis: Evolution, Trends, and Emerging Topics," Decision Analysis, INFORMS, vol. 19(4), pages 255-264, December.
    4. Cruz Rambaud, Salvador & Ortiz Fernández, Piedad & Parra Oller, Isabel María, 2023. "A systematic review of the main anomalies in intertemporal choice," Journal of Behavioral and Experimental Economics (formerly The Journal of Socio-Economics), Elsevier, vol. 104(C).

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Jeffery L. Guyse & Jay Simon, 2011. "Consistency Among Elicitation Techniques for Intertemporal Choice: A Within-Subjects Investigation of the Anomalies," Decision Analysis, INFORMS, vol. 8(3), pages 233-246, September.
    2. Scholten, Marc & Read, Daniel, 2006. "Beyond discounting: the tradeoff model of intertemporal choice," LSE Research Online Documents on Economics 22710, London School of Economics and Political Science, LSE Library.
    3. Paola Manzini & Marco Mariotti, 2007. "Choice over Time," Working Papers 605, Queen Mary University of London, School of Economics and Finance.
    4. Guyse, Jeffery L. & Keller, L. Robin & Eppel, Thomas, 2002. "Valuing Environmental Outcomes: Preferences for Constant or Improving Sequences," Organizational Behavior and Human Decision Processes, Elsevier, vol. 87(2), pages 253-277, March.
    5. Galizzi, Matteo M. & Miraldo, Marisa & Stavropoulou, Charitini & van der Pol, Marjon, 2016. "Doctor–patient differences in risk and time preferences: A field experiment," Journal of Health Economics, Elsevier, vol. 50(C), pages 171-182.
    6. Musau, Andrew, 2009. "Modeling Alternatives to Exponential Discounting," MPRA Paper 16416, University Library of Munich, Germany.
    7. Read, Daniel & Roelofsma, Peter H. M. P., 2003. "Subadditive versus hyperbolic discounting: A comparison of choice and matching," Organizational Behavior and Human Decision Processes, Elsevier, vol. 91(2), pages 140-153, July.
    8. Mohammed Abdellaoui & Han Bleichrodt & Olivier l'Haridon & Corina Paraschiv, 2013. "Is There One Unifying Concept of Utility?An Experimental Comparison of Utility Under Risk and Utility Over Time," Management Science, INFORMS, vol. 59(9), pages 2153-2169, September.
    9. Cruz Rambaud, Salvador & Ortiz Fernández, Piedad & Parra Oller, Isabel María, 2023. "A systematic review of the main anomalies in intertemporal choice," Journal of Behavioral and Experimental Economics (formerly The Journal of Socio-Economics), Elsevier, vol. 104(C).
    10. Jinrui Pan & Craig S. Webb & Horst Zank, 2019. "Delayed probabilistic risk attitude: a parametric approach," Theory and Decision, Springer, vol. 87(2), pages 201-232, September.
    11. Thomas Epper & Helga Fehr-Duda, 2012. "The missing link: unifying risk taking and time discounting," ECON - Working Papers 096, Department of Economics - University of Zurich, revised Oct 2018.
    12. Marjon van der Pol & John Cairns, 2011. "Descriptive validity of alternative intertemporal models for health outcomes: an axiomatic test," Health Economics, John Wiley & Sons, Ltd., vol. 20(7), pages 770-782, July.
    13. Venkataraghavan Krishnaswamy & R. P. Sundarraj, 2019. "Impatience Characteristics in Cloud-Computing-Services Procurement: Effects of Delay Horizon and Situational Involvement," Group Decision and Negotiation, Springer, vol. 28(5), pages 961-990, October.
    14. Uri Ben-Zion & Jan Pieter Krahnen & TAL SHAVIT, 2007. "Subjective Evaluation Of Delayed Risky Outcomes: An Experimental Approach," Working Papers 0709, Ben-Gurion University of the Negev, Department of Economics.
    15. Daniel Read & Christopher Y. Olivola & David J. Hardisty, 2017. "The Value of Nothing: Asymmetric Attention to Opportunity Costs Drives Intertemporal Decision Making," Management Science, INFORMS, vol. 63(12), pages 4277-4297, December.
    16. Huang, Yeu-Shiang & Wu, Hui-Chen, 2007. "A power law type of time preference on intertemporal choices," European Journal of Operational Research, Elsevier, vol. 183(2), pages 718-728, December.
    17. Venkataraghavan Krishnaswamy & Aseem Pahuja & R. P. Sundarraj, 2016. "Integrating Time-Preferences into E-Negotiation Systems: A Model, Elicitation Approach and Experimental Implications," Group Decision and Negotiation, Springer, vol. 25(6), pages 1137-1167, November.
    18. Anke Gerbe & Kirsten I.M. Rohde, 2010. "Risk and Preference Reversals in Intertemporal Choice," Post-Print hal-00911832, HAL.
    19. Jane E. J. Ebert & Drazen Prelec, 2007. "The Fragility of Time: Time-Insensitivity and Valuation of the Near and Far Future," Management Science, INFORMS, vol. 53(9), pages 1423-1438, September.
    20. Gerber, Anke & Rohde, Kirsten I.M., 2010. "Risk and preference reversals in intertemporal choice," Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, Elsevier, vol. 76(3), pages 654-668, December.

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:inm:ordeca:v:17:y:2020:i:1:p:24-38. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Chris Asher (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://edirc.repec.org/data/inforea.html .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.