Framing Choices Research Articles

Why framing effects can be rational

When communication is not disinterested, seemingly inconsistent preferences are predictable from language pragmatics and information non-equivalence. In addition, the classic risky choice framing effect found in the Asian disease task - risk-aversion with gains and risk-seeking with losses - applies to gambles, but tends to be overgeneralized to non-gambling situations.

Politics of attributing extreme events and disasters to climate change

AbstractClimate change certainly shapes weather events. However, describing climate and weather as the cause of disasters can be misleading, since disasters are caused by pre‐existing fragilities and inequalities on the ground. Analytic frames that attribute disaster to climate can divert attention from these place‐based vulnerabilities and their socio‐political causes. Thus, while politicians may want to blame crises on climate change, members of the public may prefer to hold government accountable for inadequate investments in flood or drought prevention and precarious living conditions. To be both strategic and moral, framing choices must therefore be sensitive to context‐dependent political meanings and particularities, and to how the values implicit within analytic frames about the causes of disasters shape policy responses. Such sensitivity requires multicausal analysis of weather‐linked disasters to illuminate a broader range of means to reduce the damages associated with climate change and weather extremes. Through examples from around the world, and especially Brazil, we discuss how and why climate‐centric disaster framing can erase from view—and, thus, from policy agendas—the very socio‐economic and political factors that most centrally cause vulnerability and suffering in weather extremes and disasters. We also offer a theoretical discussion of why attribution is not neutral. Analytic frameworks always embed choices about factors that matter, and thus are inherently normative and consequential for understandings of responsibility and action.This article is categorized under: Social Status of Climate Change Knowledge > Climate Science and Decision Making Highlight Attributing crises only to climate is inadequate from a mechanical, moral, and strategic policy points of view.

The Framing Preference for Large and Increasing Components in Static and Dynamic Descriptions.

Describing sets in terms of a two-valued variable, either value can be chosen: exam results may be referred to by pass rates or fail rates. What determines such framing choices? Building on work by McKenzie and colleagues on reference points in the production and interpretation of framed information, we investigate two determinants of frame choice. One is that speakers tend to focus on the component that has increased vis-à-vis a previous state, the other is the tendency to choose the component larger than 50%. We propose to view reference points as pointing to different kinds of communicative relevance. Hence the use of the previous state and the 50% reference points by speakers is not just a function of the information, but is co-determined by a communicative cue in the context: the question being asked about this information. This line of thought is supported by two experiments containing items offering two-sided distribution information at two points in time. Our first experiment employs a static task, requiring a description of the most recent situation. The second experiment uses a dynamic task, asking participants to describe the development between the two time points. We hypothesize that in static tasks the component size is the strongest frame choice determinant, while in dynamic tasks frame choice is mainly driven by whether a component has increased. The experiments consist of 16 different scenarios, both with symmetrical contrasts (i.e., dogs vs. cats) and with asymmetrical ones (i.e., winning vs. losing). Both experiments support the hypotheses. In the static task, the size effect is the only consistent effect; in the dynamic task, the effect of direction of change is much larger than that of size. This pattern of differences between size and change effects applies across symmetrical and asymmetrical contrasts. Our experiments shed light on cognitive and communicative regularities involved in the production of framed messages: people do tend to prefer larger and increasing components when choosing a frame, but the relative strength of both these preferences depends on the communicative task.

The Framing of machine learning risk prediction models illustrated by evaluation of sepsis in general wards

Problem framing is critical to developing risk prediction models because all subsequent development work and evaluation takes place within the context of how a problem has been framed and explicit documentation of framing choices makes it easier to compare evaluation metrics between published studies. In this work, we introduce the basic concepts of framing, including prediction windows, observation windows, window shifts and event-triggers for a prediction that strongly affects the risk of clinician fatigue caused by false positives. Building on this, we apply four different framing structures to the same generic dataset, using a sepsis risk prediction model as an example, and evaluate how framing affects model performance and learning. Our results show that an apparently good model with strong evaluation results in both discrimination and calibration is not necessarily clinically usable. Therefore, it is important to assess the results of objective evaluations within the context of more subjective evaluations of how a model is framed.

Opt-out choice framing attenuates gender differences in the decision to compete in the laboratory and in the field

Research shows that women are less likely to enter competitions than men. This disparity may translate into a gender imbalance in holding leadership positions or ascending in organizations. We provide both laboratory and field experimental evidence that this difference can be attenuated with a default nudge-changing the choice to enter a competitive task from a default in which applicants must actively choose to compete to a default in which applicants are automatically enrolled in competition but can choose to opt out. Changing the default affects the perception of prevailing social norms about gender and competition as well as perceptions of the performance or ability threshold at which to apply. We do not find associated negative effects for performance or wellbeing. These results suggest that organizations could make use of opt-out promotion schemes to reduce the gender gap in competition and support the ascension of women to leadership positions.

Using Choice Framing to Improve the Design of Agricultural Subsidy Schemes

Existing agri-environment subsidy schemes have suffered from poor uptake. The prospect of the UK’s exit from the EU means that agricultural financial subsidies will likely need to be redesigned. This paper leverages insights from prospect theory to test three different aspects of policy framing, which we hypothesised will affect the decisions made by farmers in a policy context. Using a randomised quasi-experimental survey on UK farmers, we find evidence that mental accounting and loss aversion affects policy-related decision-making. Our findings have implications for the design of future policy, and specifically highlight the importance of (i) whether payments are integrated or segregated, and the need for a reduction in application burden; (ii) the labelling applied to agricultural funding schemes; (iii) and the importance of reference points in devising new scheme alternatives.

Framing and insurance choices

AbstractThe presentation of objective information should not affect a rational decision‐maker; however, in practice, it often does. This paper studies the effect of the framing of contingencies on insurance choices. In several experiments, we presented participants with differently framed insurance tasks, where they had to choose deductibles against two different types of losses. The treatment group received a broad description of the risky situation and was asked to decide on the deductibles jointly, whereas the control group received a narrow description of the same task and was asked to decide on the deductibles separately. We discovered that the distribution of the insurance premium paid was identical in all groups, but the actual choices of the insurance plans were significantly diverse: On average, the treatment group preferred more similar deductibles than did the control group. These results indicate the importance of framing in insurance decision‐making.

Risky choice framing by experience: A methodological note

AbstractIn classic research on judgment and decision making under risk, risk is described by providing participants with the respective outcomes and probabilities in a summary format. Recent research has introduced a different paradigm – decisions-by-experience – where participants learn about risk by sampling from the outcomes, rather than by summary descriptions. This latter research reports a description-experience gap, indicating that some of the classic patterns of risk attitude reverse when people experience the risk. Recent research has attempted to investigate risky choice framing in the decisions-by-experience paradigm. I discuss how this research runs into problems in properly manipulating framing in decisions by experience. Drawing from framing research with animals, I argue that framing effects also exist in experience tasks. The classic Asian Disease task, however, awaits proper translation into an experience paradigm.

The Rule of Choice: Frames and Overflows in the History of New York City Roadway Planning

Two episodes of roadway planning in New York City—the 1937 Henry Hudson Parkway construction and the 2018 congestion pricing legislation—show the dangers and productive possibilities that result when planners “frame” problems as to be resolved by the choices of either experts or individual urban residents. Framing planning as a matter of choices is a reductive dualism that ignores the intellectual, material, and networked relationships that “overflow” such narrow conceptions. Planners and advocates seeking to intervene in choice frames, from Jane Jacobs to congestion pricing advocates, have repurposed metaphors, technology, and scale to link individuals with community, mobility with environmentalism, and planning with politics.

The pathway to marketplace insight: structuring the analysis context

PurposeBy clearly mapping the pathway for managing the early stages of any marketplace analysis project, its definition, scope, framing, focus, perspective, context, imagination and data choices – the odds of generating important strategic insight can be greatly increased for executives as well as analysis teams.Design/methodology/approachA marketing analysis team should pay specific attention to how it organizes the analysis context’a process called “Structuring”.FindingsA working definition of insight: new marketplace understanding that makes a difference to the organization’s thinking, decision making and action.Practical/implications10; Nothing constricts the insight structuring process as much as lack of imagination!Originality/valueThe choice of analysis scope, framing, focus, perspective or methods is a critical part of the marketplace analysis structuring process that increases the possibility of distinctly different strategic inferences emerging. The article is a much needed guide to mastering strategic insight for executives and marketplace analysts.

Positivity helps the medicine go down: Leveraging framing and affective contexts to enhance the likelihood to take medications.

Affect can influence judgments and decision-making in multiple ways. One way is through (a) integral affect, or affect related to the choice at hand, and another way is through (b) incidental affect, or affect unrelated to the choice at hand. Research suggests integral affect influences risk-related decision-making, especially in the context of risky choice framing. However, the role of affect in other forms of framing (e.g., attribute framing) has received little attention. We examined how integral affect (Study 1) along with incidental affect (Study 2) can alter perceptions of risk and likelihood to take hypothetical medications. Participants read pamphlets about medications with unique side effects presented as a gain (e.g., 86% of people who took this medication did not experience nausea) or loss (e.g., 14% of people who took this medication did experience nausea). Study 2 extended Study 1 by manipulating incidental affect through positive, neutral, and negative affective contexts to examine its impact on subsequent evaluations of framed information. Studies 1 and 2 measured positive and negative feelings about medications, risk perceptions, and likelihood of taking medications. Across both studies, gain-framed attributes led to more positive integral affect, subsequently increasing likelihood to take medications, whereas loss-framed attributes led to more negative feelings and increased perceived riskiness of medications. Study 2 found that positive affective contexts indirectly led to an increased likelihood to take medication by increasing positive feelings about the medications. Taken together, leveraging positivity through gain frames and positive contexts could improve adherence to medication plans. (PsycInfo Database Record (c) 2021 APA, all rights reserved).

Acute effects of high-potency cannabis flower and cannabis concentrates on everyday life memory and decision making

Statewide legislation has increased public access to high-potency cannabis flower and concentrates, yet federal restrictions limit researchers’ access to relatively low-potency whole-plant cannabis. The goal of this study was to examine the acute effects of high-potency cannabis on cognition using a novel methodology. We further sought to compare cognitive effects of high-potency cannabis flower with and without cannabidiol (CBD), as well as cannabis concentrates to cannabis flower. 80 cannabis users were randomly assigned to stay sober or use their funds to purchase one of three high-potency cannabis products: (1) high-potency flower (≥ 20% THC) without CBD, (2) high-potency flower with CBD, (3) high-potency concentrates (≥ 60% THC) with CBD. Participants were observed over Zoom videoconferencing while inhaling their product or remaining sober and then were administered tests of everyday life memory (prospective, source, temporal order, and false memory) and decision making (risky choice framing, consistency in risk perception, resistance to sunk cost, and over/under confidence) over Zoom. High-potency cannabis flower with CBD impaired free recall, high-potency flower without CBD and concentrates had detrimental effects on source memory, and all three products increased susceptibility to false memories. CBD did not offset impairments and concentrates were self-titrated producing comparable intoxication and impairment as flower.

Framing Effects on Decision-Making for Diagnostic Genetic Testing: Results from a Randomized Trial.

Genetic testing is increasingly part of routine clinical care. However, testing decisions may be characterized by regret as findings also implicate blood relatives. It is not known if genetic testing decisions are affected by the way information is presented (i.e., framing effects). We employed a randomized factorial design to examine framing effects on hypothetical genetic testing scenarios (common, life-threatening disease and rare, life-altering disease). Participants (n = 1012) received one of six decision frames: choice, default (n = 2; opt-in, opt-out), or enhanced choice (n = 3, based on the Theory of Planned Behavior). We compared testing decision, satisfaction, regret, and decision cognitions across decision frames and between scenarios. Participants randomized to ‘choice’ were least likely to opt for genetic testing compared with default and enhanced choice frames (78% vs. 83–91%, p < 0.05). Neither satisfaction nor regret differed across frames. Perceived autonomy (behavioral control) predicted satisfaction (B = 0.085, p < 0.001) while lack of control predicted regret (B = 0.346, p < 0.001). Opting for genetic testing did not differ between disease scenarios (p = 0.23). Results suggest framing can nudge individuals towards opting for genetic testing. These findings have important implications for individual self-determination in the genomic era. Similarities between scenarios with disparate disease trajectories point to possible modular approaches for web-based decisional support.

Firmer Roots of Ethnicity and Nationalism? New Historical Research and Its Implications for Political Science

Among social scientists, constructivism has long reigned supreme in the study of ethnicity, nationality, and nationalism. Accordingly, scholars have highlighted the role of cultural framing and political choice in the definition of ethnic categories, their fluidity, and their flexible boundaries. Conversely, they have deemphasized the historical roots of ethnicity and depicted nations as the contested products of nationalist movements and political leaders and as (merely) “imagined communities” (Anderson 1991). Although constructivism encompasses a broad gamut of theories that differ in the malleability ascribed to ethnicity (Chandra 2012, 19–22, 139–49), recent authors have emphasized its susceptibility to change by highlighting manipulation by political-electoral entrepreneurs (Wilkinson 2012) and focusing on “identity in formation” (Laitin 1998), “ethnicity without groups” (Brubaker 2004), and “imagined noncommunities” characterized by “national indifference” (Zahra 2010).

Numbers do not add up! The pragmatic approach to the framing of medical treatments

AbstractThe risky choice framing effect disclosed that presenting data in a loss scenario lead decision-makers towards risky choices. Conversely, a gain scenario prevents them from taking a risk. Framing effect robustness has been widely confirmed by psychological literature. However, the framing of medical treatments, based on McNeil et al. (1982) paradigm, raised both methodological doubts and contrasting evidence. Our research aimed to investigate the presence and the nature of the framing effect in the McNeil et al. (1982) paradigm. In particular, we thought that the obtained switch of preferences across frames was due to a misleading formulation of the data given in a negative cumulative frequency format. We conducted three studies: (1) we replicated McNeil et al.’s (1982) original study (N=150) with medicine (n=50), statistics (n=50) and lay (n=50) students; (2) we tested (N=180) our hypothesis by comparing a cumulative frequency format with an alternative version, namely a linear progression one; (3) we compared (N=430) the effect of different formats (cumulative frequency, linear progression and interval frequency) on choices. Our results showed that, while the framing effect is present when employing a cumulative frequency format, it disappears when using a linear progression one. Moreover, our results show that decision-makers better understand information when given in a linear progression and an interval frequency format. In the current paper, we argue that the way in which a problem is formulated plays a relevant role in the representation of the decisional task and the decision-making.

Framing and blaming: Media coverage of coal mining accident coverups in China

Coverups and under-reporting of coal mining accidents are pervasive in China, but no research has studied how the media has portrayed these accident coverups or attributed responsibility. By extracting news articles from major Chinese news outlets, this study shows that the coverup cases receiving the most coverage were those with high casualties and the involvement of government officials and journalists, while other cases did not receive much media attention. The media also intimated pervasive collusion between the government and coalmines. More blame was attributed to local officials than to coalmine owners. Victims’ families were also accused of accepting higher compensation and being part of the coverup network. This study further explores the underlying motivations for the media's framing choices and their possible effects on society and policymaking. It maintains that the portrayal of pervasive government-coalmine collusion in coverage of accident coverups may have led to more similar incidents.

School composition and multiple ethnic identities of migrant-origin adolescents in the Netherlands

ABSTRACT Ethnic identity is central to many contemporary discussions of belonging and assimilation of migrant-origin youth. Studies typically focus on a single minority identity. Identity theory implies, however, that individuals may hold multiple ethnic identities, or none, and these may find expression to a greater or less extent depending on context. Using a nationally representative, longitudinal study of Dutch teenagers, we investigate the role of classroom ethnic composition in shaping multiple ethnic identity expression. Framing identity choices as a relational process, we show that the number of ethnic identities that children with a migrant-origin background choose is greater for those students who are exposed to a more ethnically diverse context, while less diverse classrooms foster ethnic identification with no or fewer minority groups. Classification of migrant-origin students with a single (minority) ethnicity may thus be an oversimplification of ethnic identity, even for those from a single country of origin.

Risky choice framing with various problem descriptions: A replication and extension study

AbstractIn “Risky choice framing: Task versions and a comparison of prospect theory and fuzzy-trace theory”, Kühberger and Tanner (2010) examined the impacts of removing stated zero/non-zero complements of risky options on the gain/loss framing effect. They also tested two rival theoretical explanations for this effect: prospect theory and fuzzy-trace theory. The present study aimed to examine the reliability and robustness of the evidence provided by Kühberger and Tanner by precise replication in Study 1. The original findings were reported for conditions in which the probability of the risky option was fixed, and the expected value of the two alternatives was approximately equivalent. The present study also aimed to examine the generality of their findings under additional conditions in which large, medium and small probabilities of the risky option were assigned, and the expected value of the certain or risky options differed. The main findings of Kühberger and Tanner (2010) were successfully replicated and confirmed under the original and additional conditions. The implications of these findings are discussed.

Choice architecture in physician–patient communication: a mixed-methods assessments of physicians’ competency

BackgroundClinicians’ use of choice architecture, or how they present options, systematically influences the choices made by patients and their surrogate decision makers. However, clinicians may incompletely understand this influence.ObjectiveTo assess...

Impact of nonclinical factors on intensive care unit admission decisions: a vignette-based randomized trial (V-TRIAGE).

ObjectiveTo assess the impact of intensive care unit bed availability, distractors and choice framing on intensive care unit admission decisions.MethodsThis study was a randomized factorial trial using patient-based vignettes. The vignettes were deemed archetypical for intensive care unit admission or refusal, as judged by a group of experts. Intensive care unit physicians were randomized to 1) an increased distraction (intervention) or a control group, 2) an intensive care unit bed scarcity or nonscarcity (availability) setting, and 3) a multiple-choice or omission (status quo) vignette scenario. The primary outcome was the proportion of appropriate intensive care unit allocations, defined as concordance with the allocation decision made by the group of experts.ResultsWe analyzed 125 physicians. Overall, distractors had no impact on the outcome; however, there was a differential drop-out rate, with fewer physicians in the intervention arm completing the questionnaire. Intensive care unit bed availability was associated with an inappropriate allocation of vignettes deemed inappropriate for intensive care unit admission (OR = 2.47; 95%CI 1.19 - 5.11) but not of vignettes appropriate for intensive care unit admission. There was a significant interaction with the presence of distractors (p = 0.007), with intensive care unit bed availability being associated with increased intensive care unit admission of vignettes inappropriate for intensive care unit admission in the distractor (intervention) arm (OR = 9.82; 95%CI 2.68 - 25.93) but not in the control group (OR = 1.02; 95%CI 0.38 - 2.72). Multiple choices were associated with increased inappropriate allocation in comparison to the omission group (OR = 5.18; 95%CI 1.37 - 19.61).ConclusionIntensive care unit bed availability and cognitive biases were associated with inappropriate intensive care unit allocation decisions. These findings may have implications for intensive care unit admission policies.