Belief in a Loving Versus Punitive God and Behavior.

We examined the extent to which beliefs in a loving God and punitive God correspond with self-reported behavior in an online, longitudinal survey involving three waves of data collection, each separated by 6 months. Adolescents (N = 760) reported the extent to which they believed in a loving God and a punitive God (Times 1 and 3) and reported their engagement in benevolent (helping and forgiveness) and aggressive behavior (Times 2 and 3). Participants strongly endorsed a loving God but not a punitive God. In addition, belief in a loving God corresponded with reports of less aggressive and more benevolent behavior, whereas belief in a punitive God corresponded with more aggressive and less benevolent behavior.

Powerful audiences are linked to health information avoidance: Results from two surveys.

OBJECTIVE: We examined the extent to which community members avoid medical information that they may very much want, yet fear that others may use to harm them. METHODS: In two online studies, we surveyed participants (N = 659) about their experiences with insurer and employer harm, past avoidance of medical information, intentions to avoid medical information, and reasons for avoiding medical information. Study 2 was a conceptual replication of Study 1 with some minor variations. RESULTS: Several key findings emerged. 1) Although reports of past audience harm were relatively rare, reports of past avoidance were common, both for audience reasons and resource reasons. 2) Participants who were younger and who reported avoiding medical tests in the past (for audience or resource reasons) generally reported greater intentions to avoid health information in the future. 3) Participants reported that receiving unfavorable medical test results would elicit more harm from financially powerful audiences (health insurers and employers) than from interpersonally powerful audiences (close friends/family and others). 4) Participants indicated that the prospect of harm from an audience (i.e., negative effects on insurance coverage) rather than the prospect of bad news would dissuade them from seeking a medical test. Finally, 5) Participants reported that they were most inclined to avoid testing for medical conditions that were untreatable, unimportant, embarrassing/stigmatizing, or expensive. CONCLUSIONS: Findings demonstrate that people are concerned with audience perceptions of their health and these concerns may adversely affect decision making and behavior.

The role of powerful audiences in health information avoidance.

BACKGROUND: Although people may want to learn information, concerns about how audiences (persons or entities privy to one's behavior or information) might respond may motivate people to avoid information that audiences could use to threaten resources or harm them. PURPOSE: We examined whether powerful audiences prompt health risk information avoidance. METHODS: We tested in two studies (N = 843 adults 25 and older, 75% White) the influence of different audiences on medical information avoidance. We manipulated the audience and examined the consequences for avoidance of health risk information. RESULTS: Participants avoided personal health risk information significantly more when they believed that a powerful audience (an employer or insurance company) might learn their results from a health risk test than when they believed a non-powerful audience (health researchers) might learn their results. Exploratory mediation analyses revealed that these effects were partially mediated by participant expectations of likelihood of powerful audience harm. CONCLUSIONS: Results suggest that people may choose to remain ignorant of potentially important health risks if they believe that powerful audiences can use that information to harm them.

Understanding the Cognitive and Affective Mechanisms that Underlie Proxy Risk Perceptions among Caregivers of Asthmatic Children.

OBJECTIVE: Medical decisions made on behalf of another person-particularly those made by adult caregivers for their minor children-are often informed by the decision maker's beliefs about the treatment's risks and benefits. However, we know little about the cognitive and affective mechanisms influencing such "proxy" risk perceptions and about how proxy risk perceptions are related to prominent judgment phenomena. METHODS: Adult caregivers of minor children with asthma ( N = 132) completed an online, cross-sectional survey assessing 1) cognitions and affects that form the basis of the availability, representativeness, and affect heuristics; 2) endorsement of the absent-exempt and the better-than-average effect; and 3) proxy perceived risk and unrealistic comparative optimism of an asthma exacerbation. We used the Pediatric Asthma Control and Communication Instrument (PACCI) to assess asthma severity. RESULTS: Respondents with higher scores on availability, representativeness, and negative affect indicated higher proxy risk perceptions and (for representativeness only) lower unrealistic optimism, irrespective of asthma severity. Conversely, respondents who showed a stronger display of the better-than-average effect indicated lower proxy risk perceptions but did not differ in unrealistic optimism. The absent-exempt effect was unrelated to proxy risk perceptions and unrealistic optimism. CONCLUSION: Heuristic judgment processes appear to contribute to caregivers' proxy risk perceptions of their child's asthma exacerbation risk. Moreover, the display of other, possibly erroneous, judgment phenomena is associated with lower caregiver risk perceptions. Designing interventions that target these mechanisms may help caregivers work with their children to reduce exacerbation risk.

Gun attitudes on campus: United and divided by safety needs.

All people share a need for safety. Yet people's pursuit of safety can conflict when it comes to guns, with some people perceiving guns as a means to safety and others perceiving guns as a threat to safety. We examined this conflict on a U.S. college campus that prohibits guns. We distinguished between people (N = 11,390) who (1) own a gun for protection, (2) own a gun exclusively for reasons other than protection (e.g., collecting, sports), and (3) do not own a gun. Protection owners felt less safe on campus and supported allowing guns on campus. They also reported that they and others would feel safer and that gun violence would decrease if they carried a gun on campus. Non-owners and non-protection owners felt the reverse. The findings suggest that protection concerns, rather than gun-ownership per se, account for diverging perceptions and attitudes about guns and gun control.