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A fresh look at primary prevention for health risks
1Department of Finance, University of Iowa, Iowa City, Iowa, USA.
Health Economics
|March 3, 2021
Summary
Risk preferences significantly influence health risk prevention strategies. While higher risk aversion can be complex, increased downside risk aversion consistently reduces optimal prevention efforts.
Area of Science:
- Health economics
- Decision theory
- Behavioral economics
Background:
- Understanding individual risk preferences is crucial for designing effective public health interventions.
- Previous research has explored risk attitudes in financial contexts, but less so for health-related primary prevention.
Purpose of the Study:
- To analyze the impact of different risk preferences on optimal primary prevention strategies for health risks.
- To investigate the role of downside risk aversion and fear of sickness in health prevention decisions.
Main Methods:
- Utilizing the Kihlstrom and Mirman (1974) transformation function approach to ensure consistent ordinal preferences.
- Developing a theoretical framework to model health risk prevention decisions based on utility theory.
Main Results:
- Higher risk aversion's effect on optimal prevention is contingent on a probability threshold, potentially increasing or decreasing it.
- Elevated downside risk aversion consistently leads to reduced optimal prevention efforts for health risks.
- Fear of sickness was found to be an irrelevant factor in optimal health prevention decisions within this model.
Conclusions:
- Downside risk aversion is a critical determinant of optimal health risk prevention.
- Health risk prevention exhibits unique characteristics compared to financial risk management.
- Policy implications may involve tailoring interventions based on specific risk aversion profiles.
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