Effects Of Multiple Psychological Distances And Construal On Risk Perception

Risk perception is the origin of risk perception psychology.One hot issue which attracts the attention of many researchers is the potential psychological mechanisms of some factors affecting risk perception in this field.The study is based on the perspective of the construal level theory(CLT)and psychological distance,examining the effect of experiencing two dimensions of psychological distance simultaneously and construal on risk perception,and proposes that the effect of multiple distances on risk perception is consistent with the fit effect.When a risk event involves two(or more)dimensions of psychological distance,they interactively influence the assessment of risk events.Specifically,when the two dimensions(or more)are both close,the individual has the highest risk perception of the event.When one dimension(or more)is distant,the individual's perception of the risk of the event is moderate.When two dimensions(or more)are both distant,the individual has the the lowest risk perception of the event.This study included three parts: Part 1 examines the generality of fit effects in various distance combinations.Part 2 examines the effect of construal level on risk perception through the use of multiple measurement and manipulation of construal level.Part 3 examines the construal level mechanisms of how multiple psychological distances impacting risk perception,using the Mediation-of-process approach.Part 1 examines the impact of multiple distances on risk perception in the three distance combinations of social-certainty distance,social-spacial distance and social-temporal distance.In Experiment 1a,the artificially manipulated probability method was used to examine the influence of social-certainty distance on the three dimensions of risk perception,finding that the three dimensions of risk perception have different meanings under the consideration of the influence of social distance.Specifically,the low probability of self risk means that the individual believes that the risk of the event is high,and the self-protection motivation drives the individual to make unrealistic and optimistic judgments.The low self-fear and willingness to act means that the individual believes that the risk of the event is low,and there is no need to worry about or take preventive measures.However,when considering the probability distance dimension,the three risk perception dimensions have the same meaning,and high probability(i.e.,low psychological distance)leads to higher risk perception.However,the three risk perception dimensions consistently show the fit effect of multiple psychological distances,that is,when a risk event involves both social and certainty distance,the risk perception of close social distance-certain events > the risk perception of close social distance-uncertain events or the risk perception of distant social distance-certain events > the risk perception of distant social distance-uncertain events.Experiment 1b examined the effect of social and certainty distance on the probability of risk using the rank-order method,showing that the multiple effects of social and certainty distance on risk perception also conform to fit effect.Experiment 2 examined the influence of social-spatial distance on risk perception and indicating that spatial distance and social distance have the same influence on risk probability.The higher the distance,the greater the risk probability.Similarly,the effect of social-spatial distance also in line with the fit effect,and that is to say,when a risk event involves both social and spatial distance,the risk perception of close social-near spacial distance events > the risk perception of close social-far spacial distance events or the risk perception of distant social-near spacial distance events > the risk perception of distant social-far spacial events.Experiment 3 examined the influence of social-temporal distance on risk perception,suggesting that temporal and social distance have the same influence on risk probability,and the higher the distance,the greater the risk probability.Similarly,the effect of social-temporal distance also accords the fit effect,meaning that,when a risk event involves both social distance and temporal distance,the risk perception of close social-near temporal distance events > the risk perception of close social-far temporal distance events or the risk perception of distant social-near temporal distance events > the risk perception of distant social-far temporal distance events.The fact that social-certainty distance,social-spacial distance and social-temporal distance have similar effects on risk perception,illustrates the homogeneity of psychological structure in terms of social distance,temporal distance,spatial distance,and probability distance,and illustrates the robustness of the fit effect as well.Part 2 examined the impact of construal level on risk perception by using different methods(i.e.,Behavioral Identification Form(BIF),"How" & "Why" task,categorization task)to manipulate the level of construal.The results show that all three methods have successfully priming the level of construal,and consistently demonstrated that low construal level lead to higher risk estimates than high construal level.Part 3 uses the Mediation-of-process approach to explore the construal level mechanisms of how multiple psychological distances impacting risk perception.The rationale for this approach is that if the effect of multiple psychological distances is indeed mediated by construal level,then “blocking” the mediator should prevent the effect from happening.In Experiment 7,we manipulated the construal level through the Behavioral Identification Form(BIF)and found that the influence of social-certainty distance on risk perception did not decrease or disappear.In Experiment 8,we used the “How” or “Why” task to manipulate the construal level and found that the impact of social-spacial distance on risk perception did not decrease or disappear.In Experiment 9,we used the categorization task to manipulate the construal level and found that the impact of social-temporal distance on risk perception did not decrease or disappear.The results of the three experiments consistently show that the construal level is not a mediator of the effect of multiple psychological distances on risk perception.In the end,the theory implications of the results to the risk perception,psychological distance and explanation level were concluded.The practice implications of the results to reduce the deviation of risk estimation and increase the environment friendly behavior were also concluded.On this basis,future research directions are discussed.