title: Misimagining the unimaginable: the disability paradox and health care decision making.
abstract: Good decision making often requires accurate predictions about how potential outcomes will make one feel. However, people often mispredict the emotional impact of unfamiliar circumstances. For example, they often overestimate the emotional impact that chronic illnesses and disability will have on their lives. In the present article, the authors look at possible sources of error in both the happiness reports of patients with chronic illness or disability and the happiness predictions of healthy people asked to imagine the same illnesses and disabilities. On balance, the available evidence suggests that, whereas patients misreport their well-being, healthy people also mispredict the emotional impact that chronic illness and disability will have on their lives.
authors.affiliation: Program for Improving Health Care Decisions, Division of General Internal Medicine, University of Michigan, Ann Arbor, MI 48109-0429, USA. paubel@umich.edu
authors.forename: Peter A
authors.initials: PA
authors.lastname: Ubel
authors.forename: George
authors.initials: G
authors.lastname: Loewenstein
authors.forename: Norbert
authors.initials: N
authors.lastname: Schwarz
authors.forename: Dylan
authors.initials: D
authors.lastname: Smith
mesh_terms: D000223:Adaptation, Psychological; D002908:Chronic Disease / Q000523:psychology; D003657:Decision Making; D003695:Delivery of Health Care; D006233:Persons with Disabilities / Q000523:psychology; D006801:Humans; D007092:Imagination; D010358:Patient Participation / Q000523:psychology; D011788:Quality of Life; D014481:United States