What did the Tversky study teach us about presenting treatment options?
It taught the most uncomfortable lesson in all of patient communication. Amos Tversky and his colleagues surveyed everyone from laypeople to medical students to physicians, all facing a life or death choice with real consequences. When they presented the options purely in terms of benefit, people picked the choice that led to the best outcome. Logical, expected. Then they reframed the exact same options in terms of loss, and they got a majority of those same people, including the doctors, to choose the worse option. Same facts, different framing, wrong decision. Sit with that. Framing was strong enough to steer educated people away from saving their own lives. So here is my take. If loss framing is that powerful, use it to push patients toward the right choice for them, not the wrong one. Point it in an ethical direction.
If the answers you are finding here resonate with you, my team and I work with a small group of clients each year. The next step is a complimentary Discovery Consultation and Practice Review with Dr. McAnally.