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The word "all" as a modifier to 600k is not in the text; see for eg: And here is the problem framed in terms of gains: If you choose Medicine A, 200,000 peop

by 001sky 13y ago

The word "all" as a modifier to 600k is not in the text; see for eg: And here is the problem framed in terms of gains: If you choose Medicine A, 200,000 people will be saved. If you choose Medicine B, there is a 33.3% chance that 600,000 people will be saved and a 66.6% chance that no one will be saved. Which medicine do you choose? Although the number of certain deaths is the same in both versions of the problem, people take the safer option The lack of scale prevents an analysis of proportionality. For example: 600k out of 500,000,000? or 600k out of 1,000,000 or 1,000,000,000? Given the downsides are equal, the omission begs the qeustion about the rate of success. The rate of success is not a trivial source of people's bias, because empirically "non-success" is often accompanied by adverse effects (a/k/a side effects) as well as additional cost. The result is a leading question. In other words, the language is manipulative. But do we really need this study to tell us this? C'mon, that is stupid. And has nothing to do with Mandela.

saraid216 13y ago
The "Asian Disease problem" is a very standard experimental psychology/economics problem. It's alternatively phrased as this: "Would you like receive 4 dollars, or would you like a 40% chance to receive 10 dollars?" The entire article is just a layer over this showing the supposed effects of asking the question in a foreign language (other comments have explained the likely problems of the experiment), and then another layer over that wrapping it in "this is totally relevant to you because Madiba". I mean, yeah. Mandela was right. But not because of the foreign language effect.
- DerpDerpDerp 13y ago
  > It's alternatively phrased as this: "Would you like receive 4 dollars, or would you like a 40% chance to receive 10 dollars?" The problem is that the rational answer to this depends on a huge amount of background information, eg, the value of certainly having some money, versus the benefit of the additional money.
  - saraid216 13y ago
    It's less of a problem when the effect is well known to hold in a variety of phrasings. It doesn't matter if it's people or dollars; it doesn't matter if it's 4 out of 10 or 8 out of 10. Further, they account for stuff like that by using large sample sizes. Different people are choosing both options. It's just that the proportions hold despite this. They've spent a good 30 years confirming this. If you really want to criticize it, it'd be worth putting together a list of studies investigating this and analyzing their methodologies for problems. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Framing_(social_sciences)#Framing_effect_in_psychology_and_economics http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Framing_(social_sciences)#Frami... http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Framing_effect_(psychology) http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Framing_effect_(psychology)

by 001sky 13y ago

saraid216 13y ago

The "Asian Disease problem" is a very standard experimental psychology/economics problem. It's alternatively phrased as this: "Would you like receive 4 dollars, or would you like a 40% chance to receive 10 dollars?" The entire article is just a layer over this showing the supposed effects of asking the question in a foreign language (other comments have explained the likely problems of the experiment), and then another layer over that wrapping it in "this is totally relevant to you because Madiba". I mean, yeah. Mandela was right. But not because of the foreign language effect.

DerpDerpDerp 13y ago
> It's alternatively phrased as this: "Would you like receive 4 dollars, or would you like a 40% chance to receive 10 dollars?" The problem is that the rational answer to this depends on a huge amount of background information, eg, the value of certainly having some money, versus the benefit of the additional money.
- saraid216 13y ago
  It's less of a problem when the effect is well known to hold in a variety of phrasings. It doesn't matter if it's people or dollars; it doesn't matter if it's 4 out of 10 or 8 out of 10. Further, they account for stuff like that by using large sample sizes. Different people are choosing both options. It's just that the proportions hold despite this. They've spent a good 30 years confirming this. If you really want to criticize it, it'd be worth putting together a list of studies investigating this and analyzing their methodologies for problems. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Framing_(social_sciences)#Framing_effect_in_psychology_and_economics http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Framing_(social_sciences)#Frami... http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Framing_effect_(psychology) http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Framing_effect_(psychology)