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A Theory of Medical Decision Making and Health: Fuzzy Trace Theory
Open accessAbstract
The tenets of fuzzy trace theory are summarized with respect to their relevance to health and medical decision making. Illustrations are given for HIV prevention, cardiovascular disease, surgical risk, genetic risk, and cancer prevention and control. A core idea of fuzzy trace theory is that people rely on the gist of information, its bottom-line meaning, as opposed to verbatim details in judgment and decision making. This idea explains why precise information (e.g., about risk) is not necessarily effective in encouraging prevention behaviors or in supporting medical decision making. People can get the facts right, and still not derive the proper meaning, which is key to informed decision making. Getting the gist is not sufficient, however. Retrieval (e.g., of health-related values) and processing interference brought on by thinking about nested or overlapping classes (e.g., in ratio concepts, such as probability) are also important. Theory-based interventions that work (and why they work) are presented, ranging from specific techniques aimed at enhancing representation, retrieval, and processing to a comprehensive intervention that integrates these components.
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“Social and contextual cues can bias the way adolescents perceive the risk involved in certain behaviors (Reyna 2008, Reyna & Adam 2003, Reyna & Farley 2006).”
From Is Adolescence a Sensitive Period for Sociocultural Processing? (2014) · cites this paper as Reyna 2008
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“Note that until now, all of these training-procedures, which yielded promising results in addiction, did so in adult samples (either students or adults with addiction problems; however, see Reyna, 2008, for training aimed at healthrelated decision-making in adolescents).”
From Addiction, adolescence, and the integration of control and motivation (2011) · cites this paper as Reyna, 2008
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Metadata
- Authors
- Reyna, V. F.
- Affiliations
- Cornell University (US)
- Corresponding author
- Reyna, Valerie F.
- ORCID
- Reyna, Valerie F.
- Venue
- Medical Decision Making
- Publisher
- SAGE Publications
- Published
- 2008-11
- Volume
- 28
- Issue
- 6
- Pages
- 850-865
- ISSN
- 0272-989X (ISSN-L)
- 1552-681X
- PMC
- PMC2617718
- OpenAlex
- W2136995860
- Cited by
- 602
- References
- 79
- Citations by year
- 2026: 19 · 2025: 26 · 2024: 17 · 2023: 26 · 2022: 40 · 2021: 38 · 2020: 43 · 2019: 30 · 2018: 49 · 2017: 46 · 2016: 40 · 2015: 42 · 2014: 38 · 2013: 48 · 2012: 37
- FWCI
- 12.57
- Type
- journal article
- Language
- en
- Open access
- green
- www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov
- Locations
- Medical Decision Making (publishedVersion)
- PubMed (publishedVersion)
- PubMed Central (acceptedVersion)
- RePEc: Research Papers in Economics (submittedVersion)
- Funders
- National Institute of Mental Health (R01MH061211, MH-061211)
- National Cancer Institute (R13CA126359)
- Topics
- Social Sciences › Decision Sciences › General Decision Sciences › Decision-Making and Behavioral Economics
- Health Sciences › Health Professions › General Health Professions › Patient-Provider Communication in Healthcare
- Health Sciences › Medicine › Family Practice › Clinical Reasoning and Diagnostic Skills
- Keywords
- fuzzy-trace theory, health behavior, risk perception, HIV prevention, cardiovascular disease, surgical risk, genetic risk, cancer prevention, retrieval, ratio concept, probability judgment, theory-based intervention
- MeSH terms
- Cardiovascular Diseases, Decision Making, Humans, Health Knowledge, Attitudes, Practice, Models, Psychological, Neoplasms, Risk Factors, Surgical Procedures, Operative, Health Behavior, HIV Infections, Fuzzy Logic, Risk Assessment, Genetic Predisposition to Disease
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