Resources Repository
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ReviewPublication 2016Remembering Howard Raiffa
Howard Raiffa (1924-2016) had a profound influence on all aspects of the decision sciences and on …
Howard Raiffa (1924-2016) had a profound influence on all aspects of the decision sciences and on the fields of systems analysis and operations research. He guided the introduction of the decision sciences into numerous fields such as business, medicine, public health, the environmental sciences, and law, and was instrumental in building world-recognized institutions such as the Kennedy School at Harvard and the International Institute for Applied Systems Analysis near Vienna, Austria. This article is a thoughtful tribute by…
Operations Research | Decision Analysis | Economics/Finance | Decision Theory | Preferences/Values | Business/Industry | Health/Medicine | Military/Defense | North America -
ArticlePublication 2007Decision Analysis: A Personal Account of How It Got Started and Evolved
In this chapter, Howard Raiffa discusses the evolution of decision analysis and his personal involvement …
In this chapter, Howard Raiffa discusses the evolution of decision analysis and his personal involvement in its development. He describes the early days of Operations Research (OR) in the late 1940s with its approach to complex, strategic decision making. After reading John von Neumann and Oskar Morgenstern’s Theory of Games and Economic Behavior (1947) and Abraham Wald’s two books (1947, 1950), he became involved in statistical decision theory. A few years later, after reading Leonard…
Operations Research | Decision Analysis | Economics/Finance | Decision Theory | Probability/Bayes | Preferences/Values | Business/Industry | Energy/Engineering | Health/Medicine -
ArticlePublication 2022Vaccinations versus Lockdowns to Prevent COVID-19 Mortality
This analysis estimated the costs associated with preventing Covid-19 deaths by vaccinations versus lockdowns. Publicly …
This analysis estimated the costs associated with preventing Covid-19 deaths by vaccinations versus lockdowns. Publicly available datasets from the Israeli Ministry of Health were used to model the parameters of the pandemic in Israel. The Oxford COVID-19 Government Response Tracker was used for quantitative data on government policies. Data on the Israeli economy were taken from the Central Bureau of Statistics. The models demonstrate that the first lockdown prevented 1022 COVID-19 deaths at the cost…
Decision Analysis | Economics/Finance | Decision Theory | Costing Methods | Health Outcomes | State-Transition | Infectious Diseases | Policy/Regulation | Government/Law | Health/Medicine | Middle East & North Africa -
ArticlePublication 2021Identifying Credible Sources of Health Information in Social Media: Principles and Attributes
Social media is widely used as a source of health information for the general public. …
Social media is widely used as a source of health information for the general public. The potential for information shared through social media to influence health outcomes necessitates action by social media platforms to enhance access and exposure to high-quality, science-based information. This paper summarizes the work of an independent advisory group convened by the National Academy of Medicine that deliberated and gathered information to develop a set of initial principles and attributes that could…
Decision Psychology | Education/Labor | Preferences/Values | Social Determinants | Policy/Regulation | Culture/Society | Health/Medicine | Science/Technology | North America -
ArticlePublication 2021Misinformation and Public Opinion of Science and Health
This article summarizes the literature on misinformation, beginning with an overview of the most common …
This article summarizes the literature on misinformation, beginning with an overview of the most common definitions of misinformation (and related terms) in the communication literature and then a review of academic studies in the areas of science and health. The author acknowledges four overarching questions that have emerged prominently in recent years: (1) What does “misinformation” (and the terms that are oftentimes treated synonymously) mean? (2) How big of a problem is it in areas…
Decision Psychology | Education/Labor | Preferences/Values | Social Determinants | Climate/Environment | Culture/Society | Energy/Engineering | Science/Technology | Global | North America -
ReviewPublication 2021European News Consumers' Perceptions of Misinformation
This study indicated that news users across ten different European countries are quite concerned about …
This study indicated that news users across ten different European countries are quite concerned about misinformation in their information environment. Respondents were most likely to associate politicians, corporations, and foreign actors with misinformation. They perceived misinformation to be most common for topics like immigration, the economy, and the environment. This offered support for the increasingly more relative and politicized status of facts in people’s credibility perceptions. Yet, differences across sources and issues were relatively modest,…
Decision Psychology | Education/Labor | Preferences/Values | Social Determinants | Culture/Society | Health/Medicine | Science/Technology | Europe -
ArticlePublication 2021COVID-19, Fake News, and Vaccines: Should Regulation Be Implemented?
This article analyzes issues concerning the establishment of compulsory vaccination against COVID-19, as well as …
This article analyzes issues concerning the establishment of compulsory vaccination against COVID-19, as well as the role of misinformation as a disincentive – especially when published by health professionals – and citizen acceptance of measures in this regard. Data from different surveys revealed a high degree of hesitation rather than outright opposition to vaccines. The most frequent complaint related to the COVID-19 vaccination was the fear of side effects. Within the Spanish and European legislative…
Decision Psychology | Education/Labor | Preferences/Values | Infectious Diseases | Social Determinants | Policy/Regulation | Culture/Society | Government/Law | Health/Medicine | Science/Technology | Global -
ArticlePublication 2020New Fronts in the War on Misinformation
The countless false claims that have spread alongside the novel coronavirus – inaccurate advice about …
The countless false claims that have spread alongside the novel coronavirus – inaccurate advice about how to prevent the virus, for example, and conspiracy theories about its origins – are just the latest manifestation of an ongoing problem: the online proliferation of misinformation about science and health. The National Academies hosted and helped organize three events focused on countering misinformation: The MisinfoCon conference, a Wikipedia Edit-a-thon, and a meeting to explore ways to expand successful…
Decision Psychology | Education/Labor | Preferences/Values | Infectious Diseases | Social Determinants | Policy/Regulation | Culture/Society | Government/Law | Health/Medicine | Science/Technology | North America -
ArticleWeb Portal 2017PLOS Collection: Economic Efficiency of HIV Services
In order to maximize the value for money for HIV services and increase efficiency without …
In order to maximize the value for money for HIV services and increase efficiency without sacrificing quality, robust and up-to-date data on costs, efficiency and its determinants are needed. This PLOS collection, Economic Efficiency of HIV Services, presents recent, high-quality evidence from low- and middle-income countries on costs and technical efficiency of HIV services and their determinants. These data contribute to the current discussion on optimizing resources for HIV services and can provide programmatic guidance for…
Operations Research | Economics/Finance | Priority Setting/Ethics | Costing Methods | Cost-Effectiveness Analysis | Infectious Diseases | Health/Medicine | Sub-Saharan Africa | Middle East & North Africa | Latin America & Caribbean | Asia & Pacific