Decision Making in Addictive Behaviors Based on Prospect Theory: A Systematic Review

Measuring self-regulation in everyday life: Reliability and validity of smartphone-based experiments in alcohol use disorder

Self-regulation, the ability to guide behavior according to one's goals, plays an integral role in understanding loss of control over unwanted behaviors, for example in alcohol use disorder (AUD). Yet, experimental tasks that measure processes underlying self-regulation are not easy to deploy in contexts where such behaviors usually occur, namely outside the laboratory, and in clinical populations such as people with AUD. Moreover, lab-based tasks have been criticized for poor test-retest reliability and lack of construct validity. Smartphones can be used to deploy tasks in the field, but often require shorter versions of tasks, which may further decrease reliability. Here, we show that combining smartphone-based tasks with joint hierarchical modeling of longitudinal data can overcome at least some of these shortcomings. We test four short smartphone-based tasks outside the laboratory in a large sample (N = 488) of participants with AUD. Although task measures indeed have low reliability when data are analyzed traditionally by modeling each session separately, joint modeling of longitudinal data increases reliability to good and oftentimes excellent levels. We next test the measures' construct validity and show that extracted latent factors are indeed in line with theoretical accounts of cognitive control and decision-making. Finally, we demonstrate that a resulting cognitive control factor relates to a real-life measure of drinking behavior and yields stronger correlations than single measures based on traditional analyses. Our findings demonstrate how short, smartphone-based task measures, when analyzed with joint hierarchical modeling and latent factor analysis, can overcome frequently reported shortcomings of experimental tasks.

How to promote the hierarchical diagnosis and treatment system: A tripartite evolutionary game theory perspective

Due to the disorderly access to medical care and inefficient use of health resources, the advancement of the hierarchical diagnosis and treatment is more valued in promoting health system reform. Hence, this article integrates prospect theory into an evolutionary game model of the local government health departments, the medical institutions, and the patients in the system promotion of the hierarchical diagnosis and treatment. The simulation shows the specific influencing mechanism of the psychological perceived value of game subjects. Then by introducing the stochastic evolutionary game model, the system promotion under different medical cultures is also discussed in detail. The results indicate that for local government health departments, the amount and duration of financial subsidies are the key factors influencing the game system's evolution. For medical institutions, participating in the hierarchical diagnosis and treatment system is relatively beneficial. For patients, the recovery rate in primary hospitals matters more than the cost of treatment. Changes in the risk sensitivity coefficient will cause the equilibrium of the game system to change. However, changes in the loss avoidance factor do not change the equilibrium and only have an impact on the speed of convergence. With the health departments' intervention, patients in rural medical culture are more inclined to support the hierarchical diagnosis and treatment system than those in urban or town medical culture. Therefore, in order to promote the hierarchical diagnosis and treatment system, this article recommends that more attention should be paid to the regulatory role of health departments and the participation improvement of medical institutions and patients.

Prospect Theory: A Bibliometric and Systematic Review in the Categories of Psychology in Web of Science

Prospect Theory (PT) is an alternative, dynamic explanation of the phenomenon of risky decision making. This research presents an overview of PT’s history in health fields, including advancements, limitations, and bibliometric data. A systematic and bibliometric review of the scientific literature included in the psychological categories of Web of Science (WoS) was performed following the PRISMA 2020 statement for systematic reviews. A total of 37 studies (10 non-empirical and 27 empirical) were included in the sample. Bibliometric results showed thematic variability and heterogeneity regarding the production, researchers, and methodologies that are used to study PT. The systematic results highlight three main fields of PT research: preventive and screening behaviors, promotion of healthy habits, and COVID-related decision making. Personal and contextual factors which alter the usual pattern specified by PT are also described. To conclude, PT currently has an interdisciplinary character suitable for health promotion, with recent studies broadening its applicability.