Greg Bender
http://www.thisoldtractor.com/gtbender
Title: The Effect of Consistent and Inconsistent Evidence and the Presence and Absence of Risk Evidence on the Perceived Risk of Acquiring AIDS
Year: 1995
Institution: Idaho State University
Abstract: This study examines how people perceive the risk of acquiring AIDS. It is important to understand how people integrate AIDS information so that information concerning AIDS can be presented more appropriately. Experiment 1 examines the relationship between various behaviors that contain some degree of risk for acquiring AIDS and the perceived risk of acquiring AIDS. Experiment 2 manipulates three independent variables concerning the perceived risk of acquiring AIDS: presence or absence of risk behavior, consistent and inconsistent evidence, and high, medium, and low levels of perceived risk. Results indicate that (a) people integrate the presence of medium and high risk behaviors in a non-additive manner, (b) inconsistent evidence is perceived as a higher risk than consistent evidence, and (c) high, medium, and low-risk behaviors are integrated differently. Implications of results are discussed.
Download: thesis.pdf [138 KB]
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