Biases in the Perceived Prevalence and Motives of Severe Acute Respiratory Syndrome Prevention Behaviors among Chinese High School Students in Hong Kong

Publication Type

Journal Article

Publication Date

1-2004

Abstract

In two studies conducted in Hong Kong during and immediately after the outbreak of severe acute respiratory syndrome (SARS), participants displayed several social cognitive biases when they estimated the prevalence of and inferred the motives underlying SARS preventive behaviors. First, participants who practiced preventive behaviors (practicers) consistently estimated that more people practiced such behaviors than did non-practicers (false consensus bias). Second, for some preventive behaviors, participants believed that their own behaviors were more motivated by prosocial concerns (relative to self-interest) than were other practicers (pluralistic ignorance). Finally, non-practicers underestimated the importance of prosocial concerns underlying some preventive behaviors (actor-observer bias). We discussed the relevance of these social cognitive biases to health education and to Hong Kong people's psychological reactions to SARS

Keywords

actor-observer bias, false consensus, pluralistic ignorance, severe acute respiratory syndrome (SARS), social cognitive biases, Hong Kong

Discipline

Asian Studies | Social Psychology

Research Areas

Psychology

Publication

Asian Journal of Social Psychology

Volume

7

Issue

1

First Page

67

Last Page

81

ISSN

1367-2223

Identifier

10.1111/j.1467-839X.2004.00135.x

Publisher

Wiley

Additional URL

https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1467-839X.2004.00135.x

This document is currently not available here.

Share

COinS