ArticleCancer epidemiology, biomarkers & prevention : a publication of the American Association for Cancer Research, cosponsored by the American Society of Preventive Oncology2014
Individual differences in aversion to ambiguity regarding medical tests and treatments: association with cancer screening cognitions.
Article in Cancer epidemiology, biomarkers & prevention : a publication of the American Association for Cancer Research, cosponsored by the American Society of Preventive Oncology, 2014. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 21 papers.
What it found
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The abstract states no effect estimate the extractor could read, or names no intervention and outcome on the map, so this paper lights no cell and moves no belief. It is still indexed, cited and linked below.
The trial behind it
Trials whose registry record cites this paper, or whose number appears in the abstract. A trial that started after this paper was published is citing it as background, not reporting it.
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Who cites it
21 citing papers in PubMed, 35 citations in OpenAlex.
- Exploring older adults' tolerance of uncertainty in colorectal cancer screening decisions.Patient education and counseling · 2026Trial
- Effect of different recruiter attire on trial participation in Lesotho: a randomized study within a trial.Trials · 2026Trial
- Psychological Impact of Ambiguous Health Messages about COVID-19.Journal of behavioral medicine · 2022Trial
- The potential of uncertainty tolerance measures to identify specific needs of first-year medical residents: an exploratory study.BMC medical education · 2025Article
- From knowledge gaps to confidence: a pilot study evaluating a multilingual skin cancer educational intervention in underserved Spanish- and Punjabi-speaking communities.International journal of women's dermatology · 2025Article
- How women respond to uncertainty in the context of genetic screening: A qualitative analysis framed by the uncertainty tolerance model.Journal of genetic counseling · 2025Article
- Conflicting health information increases fear of disease progression in HPV-infected individuals: disease uncertainty as mediator and tolerance of uncertainty as buffer.Frontiers in public health · 2025Article
- Scientific uncertainty and perceived mammography benefits in women screened for breast cancer.Cancer causes & control : CCC · 2023Article
- Perceptions and tolerance of uncertainty: relationship to trust in COVID-19 health information and vaccine hesitancy.Journal of behavioral medicine · 2023Article
- Association of Self-reported Primary Care Physician Tolerance for Uncertainty With Variations in Resource Use and Patient Experience.JAMA network open · 2022Article
- Supporting Health and Medical Decision Making: Findings and Insights from Fuzzy-Trace Theory.Medical decision making : an international journal of the Society for Medical Decision Making · 2022Article
- Factors Associated with Physician Tolerance of Uncertainty: an Observational Study.Journal of general internal medicine · 2022Observational
- Inside the 'black box' of COVID-19 vaccination beliefs: Revealing the relative importance of public confidence and news consumption habits.Social science & medicine (1982) · 2022Article
- Evidence that perceptions of and tolerance for medical ambiguity are distinct constructs: An analysis of nationally representative US data.Health expectations : an international journal of public participation in health care and health policy · 2020Article
- Effects of Media Exposure to Conflicting Information About Mammography: Results From a Population-based Survey Experiment.Annals of behavioral medicine : a publication of the Society of Behavioral Medicine · 2019Article
- Women's Attitudes Toward Invasive and Noninvasive Testing When Facing a High Risk of Fetal Down Syndrome.JAMA network open · 2019Article
- Communication of Scientific Uncertainty about a Novel Pandemic Health Threat: Ambiguity Aversion and Its Mechanisms.Journal of health communication · 2018Article
- How Patients View Lung Cancer Screening. The Role of Uncertainty in Medical Decision Making.Annals of the American Thoracic Society · 2016Article
- Factors Affecting Physicians' Intentions to Communicate Personalized Prognostic Information to Cancer Patients at the End of Life: An Experimental Vignette Study.Medical decision making : an international journal of the Society for Medical Decision Making · 2016Article
- Perceived ambiguity as a barrier to intentions to learn genome sequencing results.Journal of behavioral medicine · 2015Article
Corrections and comments
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Authors and funding
7 authors at 1 institution in 1 country.
Funding
Abstract
backgroundAversion to "ambiguity"-uncertainty about the reliability, credibility, or adequacy of information-about medical tests and treatments is an important psychological response that varies among individuals, but little is known about its nature and extent. The purpose of this study was to examine how individual-level ambiguity aversion relates to important health cognitions related to different cancer screening tests.
methodsA survey of 1,074 adults, ages 40 to 70 years, was conducted in four integrated U.S. healthcare systems. The Ambiguity Aversion in Medicine (AA-Med) scale, a measure of individual differences in aversion to ambiguity (AA) about medical tests and treatments, was administered along with measures of several cancer screening-related cognitions: perceived benefits and harms of colonoscopy, mammography, and PSA screening, and ambivalence and future intentions regarding these tests. Multivariable analyses were conducted to assess the associations between AA-Med scores and cancer screening cognitions.
resultsIndividual-level AA as assessed by the AA-Med scale was significantly associated (P < 0.05) with lower perceived benefits, greater perceived harms, and greater ambivalence about all three screening tests, and lower intentions for colonoscopy but not mammography or PSA screening.
conclusionIndividual-level AA is broadly and simultaneously associated with various pessimistic cognitive appraisals of multiple cancer screening tests. The breadth of these associations suggests that the influence of individual-level AA is insensitive to the degree and nonspecific with respect to the causes of ambiguity. IMPACT: Individual-level AA constitutes a measurable, wide-ranging cognitive bias against medical intervention, and more research is needed to elucidate its mechanisms and effects.
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Registered trials
Read under generation 80e0d062 · epoch 390. Bibliography from PubMed, PubMed Central and OpenAlex; grants from NIH RePORTER; trial links from ClinicalTrials.gov; estimates, votes and beliefs from the OpenQuestion graph.