Risk Elicitation in Precise and Imprecise Domains - A Comparative Study, Sweden and Brazil

This paper presents a comparative study between two groups from different cultural contexts, Sweden and Brazil, when choosing among risky prospects. The study explores whether there are differences in choice behaviours when the uncertainty in the prospects is expressed as interval estimates instead of the traditional use of point estimates, as well as when prospects are displayed with and without expected monetary values. Both groups display similar choice behaviours when they choose among prospects where uncertainty is expressed as point vs. interval estimates, whereas the Brazilian respondents are more affected by EMV information. The results indicate that the employment of intervals to represent uncertainty can be beneficial and could facilitate the elicitation part in the use and development of decision analytical tools. Furthermore, there is a need for more flexible tools, more adapted to a prescriptive approach, since people from different cultural contexts seem to differ in their choice behaviours.