The moderating role of perceived behavior-outcome covariation on consumer estimates of health risk

The authors examine consumer perceptions of health risk in the context of two health-related domains in which they investigate the influence of reference standard and perceived level of covariation between risky behavior and a negative health outcome across a population. The results of two studies show that the perceived level of behavior-outcome covariation moderates the effect of the reference standard that consumers use to assess health risk. Specifically, the research shows that when the perceived level of behavior-outcome covariation is high/low, consumers' estimates of health risks are higher when their current level of risky behavior is compared with the range/mean of their previous risky behavior.