RAPID: Decision-Making Involving Risk in the Immediate Aftermath of a Natural Disaster

面对自然灾害可能导致个人和家庭做出低效的决定，其中一些决定可能涉及风险。负面冲击往往会导致行为的增加，而这些行为可能会导致长期的不良后果。然而，自然灾害影响决策的机制尚不清楚。本研究将采用实验方法研究自然灾害对灾后家庭决策的影响。具体而言，这项研究将调查下列问题：（一）灾害造成的人员和经济损失是什么；（二）对医疗检查、服药等健康决定的影响；（三）可能加强或减少初步影响的个人选择的变化；（四）家庭如何应对灾害。该项目的研究结果可以揭示自然灾害的许多后果：破坏防治艾滋病毒/艾滋病或麻疹等流行病的计划。了解自然灾害影响具有风险后果的决策的机制，将有助于决策者制定更有效的方法，帮助减少自然灾害的破坏性影响。本研究项目旨在回答以下问题：(i)自然灾害在直接后果中如何影响家庭的健康和经济成果？（二）灾后家庭如何立即就医疗保健作出决定？（iii）个人偏好的变化如何调节这些影响（灾难是否会影响家庭风险或时间偏好）？（四）家庭采取了哪些应对灾害的机制？研究人员将在该地区的一个正在进行的项目中利用社区和个人层面的先验随机化，以确定自然灾害对这些结果的因果影响。本研究项目的一个主要贡献是收集了灾后家庭偏好和健康行为的临时数据。研究小组在灾区的存在使他们能够收集适当的临时数据。本研究项目的结果将为研究灾难发生后的家庭行为提供重要的数据集。研究结果还将为帮助美国和世界各地的自然灾害受害者的政策提供重要的投入。该奖项反映了美国国家科学基金会的法定使命，并通过使用基金会的知识价值和更广泛的影响审查标准进行评估，被认为值得支持。

Exposure to a natural disaster can lead individuals and families to make inefficient decisions, some of which may involve risk. Negative shocks often lead to increases in behaviors that results in bad outcomes that may persist into the long run. However, the mechanisms through which natural disasters affect decision making are not known. This research will use experimental methods to study the effects of a natural disaster on household decision making in the immediate aftermath of the natural disaster. Specifically, the research will investigate the following: (i) what are the human and economic losses due to the disaster, (ii) the effects on health decisions such as medical testing, taking medications, (iii) changes in individual choices that may reinforce or reduce the initial effects, and (iv) how household cope with the disaster. This project's findings can reveal many consequences of natural disasters: disruption of programs to combat epidemics such as HIV/AIDS or measles. Understanding the mechanisms through which natural disasters affect decisions with risky outcomes will help policy makers to craft more effective ways to help reduce the damaging effects of natural disasters. This research project seeks to answer the following questions: (i) how does a natural disaster affect the health and economic outcomes of households in the immediate aftermath? (ii) how do household make decisions about health care immediately after the disaster? (iii) how do changes in individual preferences mediate these effects (will the disaster affect household risk or time preference)? and (iv) what mechanisms do households adopted to cope with the disaster? The researchers will leverage prior randomization at the community and individual levels in an on-going project in the area to identify the causal effects of natural disaster on these outcomes. A major contribution of this research project is the collection of ephemeral data on household preferences and healthy behaviors in the immediate aftermath of the disaster. The presence of the research team in the disaster area allows the team to collect the appropriate ephemeral data. The results of this research project will provide important data sets to study household behavior in the immediate aftermath of a disaster. The results will also provide important inputs into policies to help victims of natural disasters in the US and around the world.This award reflects NSF's statutory mission and has been deemed worthy of support through evaluation using the Foundation's intellectual merit and broader impacts review criteria.