Book chapter
Between Hope and Fear: The Psychology of Risk
Advances in Experimental Social Psychology, pp.255-295
Advances in Experimental Social Psychology, v. 20, Academic Press
1987
DOI: 10.1016/S0065-2601(08)60416-5
Abstract
This chapter discusses the psychology of risk: what risk is (if it is anything at all), how people think about it, what they feel about it, and what they do about it. The chapter describes the way psychologists think about risk: how they study it, what tasks they use, what factors they vary, and what models they build (or borrow) to describe risk-taking behavior. Technically, the word risk refers to situations in which a decision is made whose consequences depend on the outcomes of future events having known probabilities. Psychological studies of risky choice (it is the term used conventionally to refer to all but the most extreme instances of ignorance or ambiguity) fall into two groups. At one extreme are the studies run by mathematically inclined experimental psychologists in which subjects make decisions about gambles described in terms of amounts and probabilities. At the other extreme are studies run by personality psychologists, who are mostly interested in individual differences in risk taking. A theory of risky choice is presented in the chapter that attempts to meld the strengths of both approaches. Empirically and methodologically it is tied to the experimental approach to risky choice. But theoretically it is more strongly tied to motivational approaches.
Details
- Title: Subtitle
- Between Hope and Fear: The Psychology of Risk
- Creators
- Lola L. Lopes - University of Wisconsin–Madison
- Resource Type
- Book chapter
- Publication Details
- Advances in Experimental Social Psychology, pp.255-295
- Series
- Advances in Experimental Social Psychology; v. 20
- DOI
- 10.1016/S0065-2601(08)60416-5
- eISSN
- 1557-8410
- ISSN
- 0065-2601
- Publisher
- Academic Press; San Diego
- Number of pages
- 41
- Language
- English
- Date published
- 1987
- Academic Unit
- Management and Entrepreneurship ; Psychological and Brain Sciences
- Record Identifier
- 9984963206002771
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