The threshold approach to medical decision-making, in which treatment decisions are made based on whether the probability of sickness exceeds a predetermined threshold, was introduced by (Pauker and Kassirer, N Engl J Med 293:229-234, 1975) and (Pauker and Kassirer, N Engl J Med 302:1109-1116,...

This paper investigates the effect of ambiguity on personal vaccination decision. We first characterize the vaccination decision in the absence of ambiguity. We then show that uncertainty about the probability of side effects and the efficacy of the vaccine always reduce take-up under ambiguity...

This paper studies how people make decisions over preventive behaviors under ambiguity (i.e., Knightian uncertainty) where they do not even know the probability of a loss. In the context of the current COVID-19 pandemic, scientific uncertainty makes it hard to evaluate not only whether one will...

In most medical decisions probabilities are ambiguous and not objectively known. Empirical evidence suggests that people's preferences are affected by ambiguity. Health economic analyses generally ignore ambiguity preferences and assume that they are the same as preferences under risk. We show...

It has been established in the medical literature that self-medicating with imperfect information about either the use of a genuine or counterfeit drug or based on wrong self-diagnosis of ailment, which is predominant especially in developing countries, is a risky investment in health capital....

Existing studies estimate health insurance-induced increases in medical care expenditure by examining medical care decisions that are aggregated to the annual level. Using employer-employee matched data from the Medical Expenditure Panel Survey, I quantify the moral hazard effect of insurance on...

Do physicians behave rationally when facing a new disease? This study assesses physicians’ ambiguity attitudes towards the COVID-19 pandemic at its early breakout and the stock market using a revealed preference approach. We find that physicians exhibit significant deviation from expected...

Do physicians behave rationally when facing a new disease? This study assesses physicians’ ambiguity attitudes towards the COVID-19 pandemic at its early breakout and the stock market using a revealed preference approach. We find that physicians exhibit significant deviation from expected...

In many consulting environments, the expert often assertively recommends the client to take an action but is vague about the probability of that action’s outcomes, making the recommendation ambiguous. This paper analytically investigates this phenomenon by incorporating the client’s optimism...

The results of an experiment extending Ellsberg's setup demonstrate that attitudes towards ambiguity and compound uncertainty are closely related. However, this association is much stronger when the second layer of uncertainty is subjective than when it is objective. Provided that the compound...