Information Presentation in Decision and Risk Analysis: Answered, Partly Answered, and Unanswered Questions

Abstract

For the last 30 years, researchers in risk analysis, decision analysis, and economics have consistently proven that decisionmakers employ different processes for evaluating and combining anticipated and actual losses, gains, delays, and surprises. Although rational models generally prescribe a consistent response, people's heuristic processes will sometimes lead them to be inconsistent in the way they respond to information presented in theoretically equivalent ways. We point out several promising future research directions by listing and detailing a series of answered, partly answered, and unanswered questions.

The Role of Decision Analysis in Risk Analysis: A Retrospective

“…Gregory and Keeney (2017) provided practical suggestions for communicating uncertainty to decision makers. They focusin particular on the use of certainty equivalents as a way to simplify the presentation of uncertainties while still representing the impact of uncertainty on the optimal decision, noting that "Leaving uncertainty out of stakeholder deliberations about important public policy choices reduces the quality of the results that are obtained and excludes participants from critical aspects of a decision-making process..." Keller and Wang (2017) discuss future research directions regarding how best to present the results of decision and risk analyses to decision makers; French, Argyris, Haywood, Hort, and Smith (2019) discussed the challenges of conveying information about spatial risks. Thus, while some of the details have changed, many of the basic challenges of risk communication enunciated by Keeney and von Winterfeldt (1986) still remain active areas of interest and research.…”

A Spatio‐Temporal Exposure‐Hazard Model for Assessing Biological Risk and Impact

“…It has, however, to be noted that supplying decisionmakers with such a tool is a long process and this article is only a step forward. (14,15) For efficiently assessing risk across space, it is crucial to match the scales of evaluation and control with the inherent scales of the processes that lead to an environmental hazard. (16) As we are motivated by the impacts of contaminants that have the potential to spread over relatively long distances, the scale of the RA should coincide with the landscape scale and should keep, as far as possible, fine-scale resolution.…”

“…Hence, one of the objectives of this work is to provide a modeling tool that will allow, in fine , risk managers to estimate the risk level across space and time. It has, however, to be noted that supplying decisionmakers with such a tool is a long process and this article is only a step forward . For efficiently assessing risk across space, it is crucial to match the scales of evaluation and control with the inherent scales of the processes that lead to an environmental hazard .…”

Tomada de decisão financeira sob condições de incerteza: estudo com alunos de graduação de contabilidade e administração de empresas

“…Nas últimas três décadas, pesquisadores em análise de risco, análise de decisão e economia têm consistentemente comprovado que os tomadores de decisões empregam diferentes processos para avaliar a respeito de perdas e ganhos. Embora os modelos racionais geralmente prescrevam uma resposta consistente, muitas vezes as decisões são inconsistentes com as informações fornecidas aos tomadores de decisão (Keller & Wang, 2016;Wang, Feng & Keller, 2013). Ao tomar uma decisão os indivíduos não conseguem analisar todas as variáveis e nem sempre as decisões são tomadas de maneira racional (Araújo & Silva, 2007), visto que decisões importantes estão em contextos de pressão e incerteza.…”