The
same authors have produced a number of interesting papers in the same vein,
easily found by search under one of their names and
'risk:ti'
Roy
Marsh
For those who are interested in the challenge of communicating risk, here
is an excellent review and set of guidelines on communicating risk:
Helping Patients Decide: Ten Steps to Better Risk
Communication.
Fagerlin A, Zikmund-Fisher BJ, Ubel PA.
And, here are interesting evidence and commentary on presenting
risk as frequencies
The 1-in-X Effect on the Subjective Assessment of Medical Probabilities
Stefania Pighin, Lucia Savadori, Elisa Barilli, Laura Cremonesi, Maurizio
Ferrari, and Jean-François Bonnefon
Med Decis Making 2011;31 721-729
http://mdm.sagepub.com/cgi/content/abstract/31/5/721
The main message is to avoid comparing frequecies with different
denominators. Eg "2 out of 3 compared with 5 out 7" is a no-no, unless you
want to impose a high cognitive load on your audience
Michael