IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/ucp/jlstud/v37y2008is2ps195-s216.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Pain and Suffering Awards: They Shouldn't Be (Just) about Pain and Suffering

Author

Listed:
  • Peter A. Ubel
  • George Loewenstein

Abstract

In this paper, we challenge the conventional view that pain-and-suffering awards should be interpreted literally as a compensation for feelings of pain and suffering. People adapt to conditions as serious as paraplegia and blindness, returning rapidly to near-normal levels of happiness, which means that pain-and-suffering awards based literally on pain and suffering would be small. We argue that compensation for these types of conditions should be larger than would be dictated by pain and suffering alone because people legitimately care about more than just the pain and suffering that results from an injury; they also care about a variety of other factors, such as their capabilities to perform various functions, that often do not affect happiness. We propose the outlines of a method for determining noneconomic damages that divides the problem into three judgments, each to be made by the constituency most competent to make it. (c) 2008 by The University of Chicago. All rights reserved.

Suggested Citation

  • Peter A. Ubel & George Loewenstein, 2008. "Pain and Suffering Awards: They Shouldn't Be (Just) about Pain and Suffering," The Journal of Legal Studies, University of Chicago Press, vol. 37(S2), pages 195-216, June.
    • Handle: RePEc:ucp:jlstud:v:37:y:2008:i:s2:p:s195-s216
    DOI: 10.1086/529072
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://dx.doi.org/10.1086/529072
    File Function: link to full text
    Download Restriction: Access to the online full text or PDF requires a subscription.
    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.1086/529072?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
    ---><---

    As the access to this document is restricted, you may want to search for a different version of it.

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Damschroder, Laura J. & Zikmund-Fisher, Brian J. & Ubel, Peter A., 2005. "The impact of considering adaptation in health state valuation," Social Science & Medicine, Elsevier, vol. 61(2), pages 267-277, July.
    2. Viscusi, W. Kip, 1988. "Pain and suffering in product liability cases: Systematic compensation or capricious awards?," International Review of Law and Economics, Elsevier, vol. 8(2), pages 203-220, December.
    3. David G. Blanchflower & Andrew J. Oswald, 2004. "Money, Sex and Happiness: An Empirical Study," Scandinavian Journal of Economics, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 106(3), pages 393-415, October.
    4. W. Kip Viscusi & Patricia H. Born, 2005. "Damages Caps, Insurability, and the Performance of Medical Malpractice Insurance," Journal of Risk & Insurance, The American Risk and Insurance Association, vol. 72(1), pages 23-43, March.
    5. Torrance, George W., 1976. "Social preferences for health states: An empirical evaluation of three measurement techniques," Socio-Economic Planning Sciences, Elsevier, vol. 10(3), pages 129-136.
    6. Pogarsky, Greg & Babcock, Linda, 2001. "Damage Caps, Motivated Anchoring, and Bargaining Impasse," The Journal of Legal Studies, University of Chicago Press, vol. 30(1), pages 143-159, January.
    7. Jonathan Baron & David A. Asch & Angela Fagerlin & Christopher Jepson & George Loewenstein & Jason Riis & Margaret G. Stineman & Peter A. Ubel, 2003. "Effect of Assessment Method on the Discrepancy between Judgments of Health Disorders People have and do not have: A Web Study," Medical Decision Making, , vol. 23(5), pages 422-434, September.
    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. Matthew Adler & Eric A. Posner, 2008. "Happiness Research and Cost-Benefit Analysis," The Journal of Legal Studies, University of Chicago Press, vol. 37(S2), pages 253-292, June.
    2. Sunstein, Cass R., 2013. "The value of a statistical life: some clarifications and puzzles," Journal of Benefit-Cost Analysis, Cambridge University Press, vol. 4(2), pages 237-261, August.
    3. Andrew E. Clark & Claudia Senik, 2011. "Is Happiness Different From Flourishing? Cross-Country Evidence from the ESS," Revue d'économie politique, Dalloz, vol. 121(1), pages 17-34.
    4. Cass R. Sunstein, 2008. "Illusory Losses," The Journal of Legal Studies, University of Chicago Press, vol. 37(S2), pages 157-194, June.
    5. Edie Greene, 2011. "Figuring Kids' Allowance and Other Conversion Problems: Commentary on Judgment by the Numbers," Journal of Empirical Legal Studies, John Wiley & Sons, vol. 8(s1), pages 262-269, December.
    6. Sofia Amaral-Garcia, 2015. "Non-economic Damages in Medical Malpractice Appeals: Does the Jurisdiction Make a Difference?," Discussion Papers of DIW Berlin 1506, DIW Berlin, German Institute for Economic Research.
    7. David W. Johnston & Michael A. Shields & Agne Suziedelyte, 2018. "Victimisation, Well†being and Compensation: Using Panel Data to Estimate the Costs of Violent Crime," Economic Journal, Royal Economic Society, vol. 128(611), pages 1545-1569, June.
    8. Noel Semple, 2021. "Good Enough for Government Work? Life-Evaluation and Public Policy," Journal of Happiness Studies, Springer, vol. 22(3), pages 1119-1140, March.

    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. Patricia Cubí‐Mollá & Mireia Jofre‐Bonet & Victoria Serra‐Sastre, 2017. "Adaptation to health states: Sick yet better off?," Health Economics, John Wiley & Sons, Ltd., vol. 26(12), pages 1826-1843, December.
    2. Octave Jokung & Serge Macé, 2013. "Long-term health investment when people underestimate their adaptation to old age-related health problems," The European Journal of Health Economics, Springer;Deutsche Gesellschaft für Gesundheitsökonomie (DGGÖ), vol. 14(6), pages 1003-1013, December.
    3. Cubi-Molla, P. & Jofre-Bonet, M. & Serra-Sastre, V., 2013. "Adaptation to Health States: A Micro-Econometric Approach," Working Papers 13/02, Department of Economics, City University London.
    4. Ronen Avraham, 2007. "An Empirical Study of the Impact of Tort Reforms on Medical Malpractice Settlement Payments," The Journal of Legal Studies, University of Chicago Press, vol. 36(S2), pages 183-229, June.
    5. John Vernon & Robert Goldberg & Joseph Golec, 2009. "Economic Evaluation and Cost-Effectiveness Thresholds," PharmacoEconomics, Springer, vol. 27(10), pages 797-806, October.
    6. Hilary A. Llewellyn-Thomas & J. Ivan Williams & Linda Levy & C.D. Naylor, 1996. "Using a Trade-off Technique to Assess Patients' Treatment Preferences for Benign Prostatic Hyperplasia," Medical Decision Making, , vol. 16(3), pages 262-272, August.
    7. Yun‐chien Chang & Theodore Eisenberg & Han‐Wei Ho & Martin T. Wells, 2015. "Pain and Suffering Damages in Wrongful Death Cases: An Empirical Study," Journal of Empirical Legal Studies, John Wiley & Sons, vol. 12(1), pages 128-160, March.
    8. John Cullis & John Hudson & Philip Jones, 2011. "A Different Rationale for Redistribution: Pursuit of Happiness in the European Union," Journal of Happiness Studies, Springer, vol. 12(2), pages 323-341, April.
    9. Alem, Yonas, 2013. "Relative Standing and Life-Satisfaction: Does Unobserved Heterogeneity Matter?," Working Papers in Economics 579, University of Gothenburg, Department of Economics.
    10. Eiji Yamamura, 2016. "Smokers’ Preference for Divorce and Extramarital Sex," Journal of Economics and Econometrics, Economics and Econometrics Society, vol. 59(2), pages 44-76.
    11. Paul Downward & Simona Rasciute, 2011. "An Economic Analysis of the Subjective Health and Well-being of Physical Activity," Chapters, in: Plácido Rodríguez & Stefan Késenne & Brad R. Humphreys (ed.), The Economics of Sport, Health and Happiness, chapter 2, Edward Elgar Publishing.
    12. Gabriel Leite Mota, 2022. "Unsatisfying ordinalism: The breach through which happiness (re)entered economics," Regional Science Policy & Practice, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 14(3), pages 513-528, June.
    13. Richard B. FREEMAN, 2010. "It's financialization!," International Labour Review, International Labour Organization, vol. 149(2), pages 163-183, June.
    14. Pawlowski, Tim & Downward, Paul & Rasciute, Simona, 2014. "Does national pride from international sporting success contribute to well-being? An international investigation," Sport Management Review, Elsevier, vol. 17(2), pages 121-132.
    15. Silvia Maja Melzer & Ruud J. Muffels, 2012. "Migrant's Pursuit of Happiness: The Impact of Adaption, Social Comparison and Relative Deprivation; Evidence from a 'Natural' Experiment," SOEPpapers on Multidisciplinary Panel Data Research 448, DIW Berlin, The German Socio-Economic Panel (SOEP).
    16. Powdthavee, Nattavudh & Wooden, Mark, 2014. "What can life satisfaction data tell us about discrimination against sexual minorities? A structural equation model for Australia and the United Kingdom," LSE Research Online Documents on Economics 60278, London School of Economics and Political Science, LSE Library.
    17. Schwarzinger, Michaël & Carrat, Fabrice & Luchini, Stéphane, 2009. ""If you have the flu symptoms, your asymptomatic spouse may better answer the willingness-to-pay question": Evidence from a double-bounded dichotomous choice model with heterogeneous anchori," Journal of Health Economics, Elsevier, vol. 28(4), pages 873-884, July.
    18. Papageorgiou, Athanasios, 2018. "The Effect of Immigration on the Well-Being of Native Populations: Evidence from the United Kingdom," MPRA Paper 93045, University Library of Munich, Germany.
    19. Andrew Friedson & Thomas Kniesner, 2012. "Losers and losers: Some demographics of medical malpractice tort reforms," Journal of Risk and Uncertainty, Springer, vol. 45(2), pages 115-133, October.
    20. Senakpon F. A. Dedehouanou & Johan Swinnen & Miet Maertens, 2013. "Does Contracting Make Farmers Happy? Evidence from Senegal," Review of Income and Wealth, International Association for Research in Income and Wealth, vol. 59, pages 138-160, October.

    More about this item

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    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:ucp:jlstud:v:37:y:2008:i:s2:p:s195-s216. 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: Journals Division (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://www.journals.uchicago.edu/JLS .

    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.