press release: Association for Psychological Science - Checking off symptoms online affects our perceptions of risk (student study)

Checking off symptoms online affects our perceptions of risk

"You've been feeling under the weather. You Google your symptoms. A half-hour later, you're convinced it's nothing serious—or afraid you have cancer. More than 60 percent of Americans get their health information online, and a majority of those decide whether to see a doctor based on what they find. "Wow, this is an era of self-diagnosis," thought Arizona State University psychologist Virginia Kwan, learning that statistic. How might information accessed online affect individual health decisions?....."

Components of family history associated with women's disease perceptions for cancer: A report from the Family Healthware™ Impact Trial - abstract

PURPOSE: To determine the specific components of family history and personal characteristics related to disease perceptions about breast, colon, and ovarian cancers.

abstract - Risky feelings: Why a 6% risk of cancer does not always feel like 6%

Objective
Emotion plays a strong role in the perception of risk information but is frequently underemphasized in the decision-making and communication literature. We sought to discuss and put into context several lines of research that have explored the links between emotion and risk perceptions.