Beyond High-Income Countries: Low Numeracy Is Associated with Older Adult Age around the World

Background

Numeracy, or the ability to understand and use numbers, has been associated with obtaining better health and financial outcomes. Studies in high-income countries suggest that low numeracy is associated with older age-perhaps especially among individuals with lower education. Here, we examined whether findings generalize to the rest of the world.

Methods

Gallup surveyed >150,000 participants for the 2019 Lloyd's Register Foundation World Risk Poll, from 21 low-income, 34 lower-middle income, 42 upper-middle income, and 43 high-income countries. Low numeracy was operationalized as failing to correctly answer, "Is 10% bigger than 1 out of 10, smaller than 1 out of 10, or the same as 1 out of 10?"

Results

Regressions controlling for participants' education, income, and other characteristics found that, worldwide, low numeracy was associated with older age, lower education, and their interaction. Findings held in each country-income category, although low numeracy was more common in low-income countries than in high-income countries.

Limitations

Age differences may reflect cohort effects and life span-developmental changes.

Discussion

Low numeracy is more common among people who are older and less educated. We discuss the need for education and interventions outside of the classroom.

Highlights

We analyzed a global survey conducted in 21 low-income, 34 lower-middle income, 42 upper-middle income, and 43 high-income countries.Low numeracy was associated with older adult age, even after accounting for age differences in education.Low numeracy was more common in older people with lower education.

Service failures in times of crisis: An analysis of eWOM emotionality

The COVID-19 pandemic continues to disrupt consumer experiences as well as service operations. Despite the magnitude of this exogenous shock, little is known about the pandemic's impact on consumers. Building on engagement theory, this study examines consumers' emotional responses to service failures on social media. Contributing to the brand equity literature, we test whether electronic word-of-mouth (eWOM) emotionality is contingent on brand strength. To do so, we analyzed 327,205 tweets directed at airline brands over the first 12 months of the pandemic in addition to data from a nonaffected period. The models show that consumers' overall emotionality in tweets was lower during the pandemic than before it. Over the course of the pandemic, levels of joy were lower while levels of sadness and anger were more prominent in tweets directed at weaker brands. Thus, brand strength still acts as a "buffer" if service failures are caused by exogenous shocks.

Local Impact of Global Crises, Institutional Trust, and Consumer Well-Being: Evidence from the COVID-19 Pandemic

Global crises have become increasingly more frequent and consequential. Yet the impact of these crises is unevenly distributed across countries, leading to discrepancies in (inter)national crisis-regulating institutions’ ability to uphold public trust and safeguard their constituents’ well-being. Employing the paradigm of citizens as customers of political institutions, drawing on attribution and sociopolitical trust theories, and using the COVID-19 pandemic as an empirical context, the authors investigate how consumers’ relative perceptions of local impact following a global crisis affect the psychological processes of institutional trust formation and consumer well-being. Conducting one survey-based study in two countries affected disproportionately by the pandemic’s first wave (the United States and Greece) and one experimental study in a third country (Italy) during the pandemic’s second wave, the authors find that institutional trust declines more in countries whose citizens hold perceptions of higher relative local impact following a global crisis; institutional blame attributions explain trust erosion; institutional distrust decreases consumer well-being and adherence to institutional guidelines; consumers’ globalization attitudes immunize international institutions from blame and distrust; and political conservatives transfer blame and distrust from national to international institutions amid global crises. The findings enrich the institutional branding and trust literatures and have implications for stakeholders involved in global crisis management (e.g., policy makers, political marketers, institutional brand managers).

Effect of COVID-19 vaccine allocation strategies on vaccination refusal: A national survey

Currently, one of the most pressing public health challenges is encouraging people to get vaccinated against COVID-19. Due to limited supplies, some people have had to wait for the COVID-19 vaccine. Consumer research has suggested that people who are overlooked in initial distribution of desired goods may no longer be interested. Here, we therefore examined people's preferences for proposed vaccine allocation strategies, as well as their anticipated responses to being overlooked. After health-care workers, most participants preferred prioritizing vaccines for high-risk individuals living in group-settings (49%) or with families (29%). We also found evidence of reluctance if passed over. After random assignment to vaccine allocation strategies that would initially overlook them, 37% of participants indicated that they would refuse the vaccine. The refusal rate rose to 42% when the vaccine allocation strategy prioritized people in areas with more COVID-19 - policies that were implemented in many areas. Even among participants who did not self-identify as vaccine hesitant, 22% said they would not want to vaccine in that case. Logistic regressions confirmed that vaccine refusal would be largest if vaccine allocation strategies targeted people who live in areas with more COVID-19 infections. In sum, once people are overlooked by vaccine allocation, they may no longer want to get vaccinated, even if they were not originally vaccine hesitant. Vaccine allocation strategies that prioritize high-infection areas and high-risk individuals in group-settings may enhance these concerns.

Benefits of heroes to coping with mortality threats by providing perceptions of personal power and reducing unhealthy compensatory consumption

Mortality threats are among the strongest psychological threats that an individual can encounter. Previous research shows that mortality threats lead people to engage in unhealthy compensatory consumption (i.e., overeating), as a maladaptive coping response to threat. In this paper, we propose that reminders of heroes when experiencing mortality threat increases perceptions of personal power, which in turn buffers the need to engage in unhealthy compensatory consumption. We test and find support for our predictions in a series of four studies that include real-world Twitter data after a series of terrorist attacks in 2016-2017, and three experimental studies conducted online and in the field with behavioral measures after Day of the Dead and during COVID-19 pandemic. These findings advance the literature on compensatory consumption, mortality threats, and the psychological functions of heroes.

Effect of mortality salience on charitable donations: Evidence from a national sample

Mortality salience refers to being reminded of death, which increases self-reported prosociality in student samples. Here, we examined effects of mortality salience on actual donations, in a national life-span sample (N = 5,376). In the mortality-salience (vs. control) condition, participants donated on average 25 cents more to charity, out of their $5 budget. This finding was unaffected by adult age or charity type, suggesting its generalizability. However, older adults donated more than younger adults. Auxiliary analyses suggested that fear of death was likely not the main mechanism underlying our findings. We discuss implications for literatures on mortality salience, aging, and charitable giving. (PsycInfo Database Record (c) 2021 APA, all rights reserved).

The breaking bad effect: Priming with an antihero increases sensation seeking

Antiheroes are characters that share features with both heroes and villains, typified as selfish and rule breakers, but who end up doing something good for society. In this research, we examined how priming people with antiheroes (vs. heroes) affected their sensation seeking. We reason that antiheroes (vs. heroes) are more associated with temporally close (vs. past and future) events. Given that sensation seeking is related to being focused on the present (vs. past or future), we hypothesized that if people are primed with antiheroes (vs. heroes) they are more likely to seek sensation. Findings from a series of five experimental studies provide insights into the effect of priming with an antihero on people's sensation seeking, providing directions for future research in psychology and practical applications in the areas of marketing strategy and consumer behaviour.