The current field study compares the time preferences of young adults of similar ages but in two very different environments, one more dangerous and uncertain than the other. Soldiers, college students and a control group of teenagers answered questionnaires about their time preferences. During mandatory service, soldiers live in a violent atmosphere where they face great uncertainty about the near future and high risk of mortality (measured by probability of survival). University students and teenagers live in much calmer environment and are tested for performance only periodically. The soldier-subjects show relatively high subjective discount rates when compared to the other two groups. We suggest that the higher subjective discount rate among soldiers can be the result of high perceived risk in the army as an institution, or higher mortality risk.

The pursuit of unhealthy behaviors, such as smoking or binge drinking, not only carries various downside risks, but also provides pleasure. A parsimonious model, used in the literature to explain the decision to pursue an unhealthy activity, represents that decision as a tradeoff between risks and benefits. We build on this literature by surveying a rural population in South Africa to elicit the perceived riskiness and the perceived pleasure for various risky activities and to examine how these perceptions relate to the pursuit of four specific unhealthy behaviors: frequent smoking, problem drinking, seatbelt nonuse, and risky sex. We show that perceived pleasure is a significant predictor for three of the behaviors and that perceived riskiness is a significant predictor for two of them. We also show that the correlation between the riskiness rating and behavior is significantly different from the correlation between the pleasure rating and behavior for three of the four behaviors. Finally, we show that the effect of pleasure is significantly greater than the effect of riskiness in determining drinking and risky sex, while the effects of pleasure and riskiness are not different from each other in determining smoking and seatbelt nonuse. We discuss how our findings can be used to inform the design of health promotion strategies.

We asked how repeated media reports on technological hazards influence an individual’s risk perception. We looked for two contradictory effects, an increasing effect of repetition on perceived risk with the first few repetitions and a decreasing effect with later repetitions, leading to the inverted U-shaped pattern. In an experiment, we demonstrated the inverted U-shaped relationship between the repetition and perceived risk in the context of food risk. The finding broadens the range of mere-exposure effects and indicates that exposure to risk information can be a double-edged sword, which brings either an increasing or a decreasing perceived risk.

This paper analyzes buying decisions when consumers consider the risk that a bottle of wine may be cork-tainted. Drawing on a sample of 804 subjects, we examine the role of gender, price level, and subjects’ country of origin and their personal cork-taint risk assessments. We find that women assess the cork-taint risk higher than men but are still more likely to buy bottles with cork closures. Young consumers from Asia are more risk-averse than people from Western countries. Gender and regional differences vanish for wines in higher price brackets. (JEL Classifications: C90, D12, L66)

The benefits of farming organically in the USA are increasingly known; however, organic farmers also encounter considerable risks, especially from weeds. Without herbicides, organic farmers can rely only on crop rotations, mechanical cultivation, manual weeding, beneficial insects and other cultural practices, termed ecological weed management (EWM), to control weeds. Despite promising results and the many ways in which EWM can be employed, it remains poorly adopted by the organic community. Organic farmers resist research and recommendations from University scientists and Extension, instead preferring to rely on local family and friends and their own experience to guide decisions. Here we investigate factors that may lead organic farmers to recognize that they need additional information about EWM and to seek that information out. Using a national survey of organic farmers (n = 554) and a risk-information seeking and processing model, we show that farmers’ risk and benefit perceptions, worry, social norms encouraging seeking out information, and farmers’ own perceived knowledge gaps, particularly with respect to their most problematic weed, influence information-seeking behavior. Identifying characteristics that may distinguish those organic farmers who need and want additional information, we provide recommendations to Extension and University scientists about how best to communicate, build trust and provide decision support to the organic community with respect to EWM.

Objectives: To evaluate factors that predict HIV testing using the model of health care utilisation as its conceptual framework and to analyse some of the factors that encourage or inhibit seeking an HIV test in this population.

Method: A cross sectional questionnaire study in two Genito-Urinary Medicine (GUM) clinics in central Scotland. A final sample of 195 represented a 91% response rate. Participants were categorised by their HIV testing status (already tested, planning to be tested, no intention to seek testing).

Results: The ‘already tested’ and ‘planning to be tested’ groups were combined as there were no significant differences on reported risk behaviours. Analysis therefore compared two groups those ‘testing’ (n = 66) and ‘not testing’ (n = 129). 67% of those not tested for HIV reported at least one HIV risk factor. Perceived risk was the strongest predictor of HIV testing using our model. Perception of risk and actual risk were not correlated. Those not seeking testing endorsed less benefits of testing and more denial of the need to be tested. Same day testing and testing without an appointment were endorsed as factors to promote testing.

Conclusion: To encourage people who have high risk factors to access HIV testing, programmes should: (1) highlight the benefits of testing which would be lost if people do not test, eg. effective drug treatments (2) increase the range of HIV testing services available (eg. same day testing). Furthermore, studies to determine the main predictors of perceived risk are needed if we are to increase testing in relevant populations.