Social Policy « Rational Decisions

BC Injury Prevention Conference: puzzles and answers

November 18, 2010 6 Comments

Last week, at the at the BC Injury Prevention Conference 2010, some presenters and attendants put forward interesting questions that manifest inconsistencies in people’s behaviour and perception of risk:

Why parents have their children wear bicycle helmets, but still refuse to use them?
Why more than 70% of Canadians think they drive better than others? Does this indicate that education campaigns have failed?¹
Why gang related crime gets more police and media attention than road crashes, when the latter produces way more fatalities than the former?¹

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Filed under Health Promotion, Injury Prevention, Road Safety, Social Policy Tagged with BC, BC Injury Research and Prevention Unit, BCAA, Conference, Decision making, IBC, ICBC, Injury Prevention, preventable.ca, public health agency of Canada, Traffic Safety Foundation

Statistics are lies!? Damn not!

August 13, 2010 7 Comments

I know this post is two weeks late and I am sorry about that. Still, better late than never.

This is a reply to Lorrie Goldstein’s column, “Stats, smoke and mirrors”, in which he rants about crime rates and Statistics Canada―the Canadian statistics agency. In my opinion, his diatribe is foolish, unfair and uninformed.

In an effort to be straightforward, this is what I will discuss:

If decision makers don’t know how to use statistics, then they are the problem; don’t blame statistics for that.
Mr. Goldstein’s “analysis” of crime rates is useless and superficial.

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Filed under Analytics, Social Policy Tagged with Canada Census, crime, crime rate, Decision making, Lorrie Goldstein, policy, Statistics Canada, Toronto Sun

Re: Can YOU stop impaired driving?

July 26, 2010 Leave a Comment

This is a blog response to the post “Can YOU stop impaired driving?” in which Sergeant Tim Burrows calls for ideas on how to tackle this problem. Here, I present my two cents:

First, don’t use threats of physical harm or death in your communications, because this kind of message is not effective with the target groups for which it is intended: male drivers and sensation seekers (this term refers to a personality trait that is associated with risk-taking and impaired driving)^{1, 2}. Moreover, some studies suggest that these messages can be counterproductive, because they induce denial (“this won’t happen to me”) and self-enhancement attitudes (“I am a better driver than the people in the ad”).

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Filed under Community, Injury Prevention, Road Safety, Social Policy Tagged with Decision making, Decision Science, Injury Prevention, police, Risk Communication, Road Safety, social marketing, toronto police, Transit

Audience analytics for road safety: personality traits

July 23, 2010 Leave a Comment

In order to be effective at educating the public, road safety campaigns must answer basic questions about drivers: who are they? Are there any identifiable groups? What gets their attention? How to communicate effectively with them? In this post, I will answer these questions in terms of personality traits, because psychological research on this area has proven to be very useful for road safety and injury prevention in general.

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Filed under Injury Prevention, Risk Communication, Road Safety, Social Policy Tagged with Decision making, Decision Science, DUI, health promotion, ICBC, impaired driving, Injury Prevention, John Vavrik, risk seeking, Road Safety, time perspective

Update:Gulf of Mexico disaster may distort perception about risks of oil tanker traffic

July 21, 2010 1 Comment

In a previous post, I pointed out that the recent disaster in the Gulf of Mexico, might cause people to overestimate the risks oil spills. I also expressed my concern with Metro Vancouver’s decision to evaluate the risks of oil tanker traffic just while the events on and off the coasts of Florida are unfolding.

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Filed under Environment, Social Policy Tagged with BP Spill, Burrard Inlet, City of Vancouver, Metro Vancouver, oil spil, oil tanker, port cities council, social marketing

“Drinking and Driving CounterAttack”: does science support tougher laws?

July 20, 2010 Leave a Comment

Drinking and driving CounterAttack is the current road safety campaign by the Province of British Columbia, ICBC and police departments around the region. While some people disagree with its core policy (harsher penalties start at alcohol levels of .05), I contend that science supports it. Read more of this post

Filed under Injury Prevention, Risk Communication, Road Safety, Social Policy Tagged with alcohol level, British Columbia, CounterAttack, harsher laws, ICBC, impaired driving, law enforcement, Road Safety, social marketing

Vancouver cyclists: how to change unsafe behaviours

July 13, 2010 2 Comments

While the municipality plans to spend $25 million dollars in bicycle infrastructure¹, other Vancouverites are concerned with the behaviour of cyclists and how to change their unsafe habits². According to the Vancouver Sun¹, many cyclists don’t know the laws, believe they don’t apply to them, or simply flout them intentionally. For instance, Statistics Canada reports that only 60% of B.C. cyclists wear helmets³. Read more of this post

Filed under Injury Prevention, Risk Communication, Road Safety, Social Policy Tagged with Bicycling Development Program, byclicle, City of Vancouver, Geoff Meggs, infrastructure, Metro Vancouver, Road Safety, social marketing, The Georgia Straight, The Vancouver Sun

Gulf of Mexico disaster may distort perception about risks of oil tanker traffic

July 8, 2010 1 Comment

Photo by Tak Ishikawa

The port cities committee of Metro Vancouver will evaluate the risks of the increasing oil tanker traffic in the region¹. This is great news! And I praise the city council’s foresight and interest in the issue. At the same time, I fear that the assessment might be distorted by the current environmental disaster in the Gulf of Mexico.

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Filed under Environment, Risk Communication, Social Policy Tagged with BP, British Petroleum, Decision Science, Metro Vancouver, Oil spill, oil tanker, Port Burrard Inlet, port cities council, Risk Communication, Risk Perception, Vancouver Sun

Playboy model is defeating scientists in PR battle over vaccines

July 7, 2010 2 Comments

Although the scientific paper that spawned fear of vaccines was officially retracted in February 2010¹, many parents are still reluctant to immunize their children. Yes, the anti-vaccination movement is still alive and kicking ², and the paper is far from being retracted in the arena of public opinion ³. Why is this happening?

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Filed under Health Promotion, Risk Communication, Social Policy Tagged with amy wallace, anti-vaccination, Anti-vaccine, Decision making, Decision Science, Erin Bilba, health promotion, irrational, Jenny McCarthy, Jim Carey, Joanna Pearlstein, Risk Communication, social marketing, vaccine, wired magazine

The psychology of the anti-vaccination movement

July 6, 2010 1 Comment

In the last decade, parents in the whole world have come to believe that the risks associated to the use of vaccines are greater than the dangers of the diseases themselves. In the first minute of this clip, Professor Richard Dawkins and Dr. Michael Fitzpatrick explain why many parents were so easily dissuaded from vaccinating their kids. Their account is consistent with psychological research on decision making:

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Filed under Health Promotion, Social Policy Tagged with Decision making, Decision Science, health promotion, Medical Decision Making, Public Health, Risk Communication, social marketing

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