Impacts of Food Hypersensitivities on Quality of Life in the UK and Willingness to Pay (WTP) to remove those impacts
Appendix N: Risk Attitudes Results
To derive a measure of risk preferences, questions from the SOEP (German Socioeconomic Panel) were included in the severe. These questions (below) ask about willingness to take risks overall, and in specific domains.
The propensity to commit to (one’s child) taking a pill to eliminate a food hypersensitivity was hypothesised to potentially be affected by one’s attitude to risk as well as characteristics such as the severity of the condition.
To derive a measure of risk preferences, questions from the SOEP (German Socioeconomic Panel) were included in the severe. These questions (below) ask about willingness to take risks overall, and in specific domains.
Figure 1 SOEP Risk Attitude question
Figure 1 SOEP Risk Attitude question (accessible version)
Are you generally a person who is fully prepared to take risks or do you try to avoid taking risk? (please choose an option where 0 means 'risk averse' and 10 means fully prepared to take risks'.
People can behave differently in different situations.
How would you rate your willingness to take risks in the following areas?
- while driving...
- in financial matters
- during leisure and sports...
- in your occupation...
- with your health...
- your faith in other people
The scores were transformed to range from 1-11 and the distribution of responses is displayed here – with a skew towards risk aversion evident.
Figure 2 Distribution of risks responses
Table 3: Tabulation of how risk averse are you?
| Risk scale | Frequency | Percent | Cumulative |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1 (risk averse) | 167 | 11.71 | 11.71 |
| 2 | 89 | 6.24 | 17.95 |
| 3 | 151 | 10.59 | 28.54 |
| 4 | 160 | 11.22 | 39.76 |
| 5 | 115 | 8.06 | 47.83 |
| 6 | 263 | 18.44 | 66.27 |
| 7 | 153 | 10.73 | 77.00 |
| 8 | 161 | 11.29 | 88.29 |
| 9 | 98 | 6.87 | 95.16 |
| 10 | 25 | 1.75 | 96.91 |
| 11 (fully prepared to take risks) | 44 | 3.09 | 100.00 |
| Total | 1426 | 100.00 | - |
The mean score was computed across all 7 questions (the distribution of scores for the 6 additional risk questions are below).
The distribution of the aggregated risk attitude scores is shown here – with a skew to the left (risk aversion evident).
Figure 3 Distribution of Aggregated risk score
Figure 4 Distribution of the responses to the six specific risk questions
How risk averse are you while driving?
How risk averse are you in financial matters?
How risk averse are you during leisure and sports?
How risk averse are you in your occupation?
How risk averse are you with your health?
How risk averse are you with your faith in other people?
