Traditional economic models of household behavior are generally not well suited for modeling the economic impacts of extreme events, due to (1) their assumptions of perfect rationality and perfect information; (2) their omission of important non-market factors on behavior; and (3) their omission of the unusual, scenariospecific conditions that extreme events pose on decision making. To overcome these shortcomings, we developed a cognitive-economic model of household behavior that captures and integrates many of these important psychological, non-market, and extreme-event effects. This model of household behavior was used in prototype simulations of how a pandemic influenza can impact the demand for food in a large metropolitan city. The simulations suggest that the impacts to food demand caused by household stress, fear, hoarding, and observing others doing the same could be far greater than those caused simply by the disease itself.
This is a preview of subscription content, log in via an institution.
Buying options
Tax calculation will be finalised at checkout
Purchases are for personal use only
Learn about institutional subscriptionsPreview
Unable to display preview. Download preview PDF.
References
Canadian Supply Chain Food Safety Coalition (2007) Pandemic Influenza Emergency Simulation Project for the Agri-Food Sector. The Zeta Group, Ottawa, Ontario.
City of Albuquerque (2008) GIS Data from the City of Albuquerque. Albuquerque, NM.
The D&B Corporation (2007) Short Hills, NJ.
Ehlen M.A., Downes P.S., Scholand, A.J. (October 2007) Economic Impacts of Pandemic Influenza on the U.S. Manufactured Foods Industry. DHS, NISAC, Albuquerque, NM.
Ehlen, M.A., Downes, P.S., Scholand, A.J. (March 2007) A Post-Katrina Comparative Economic Analysis of the Chemicals, Food, and Goodyear Value Chains (OUO). DHS, Albuquerque, NM.
Eidson, E.D., Ehlen, M.A. (2005) NISAC Agent-Based Laboratory for Economics (N-ABLE), SAND2005-0263. Sandia National Laboratories, Albuquerque, NM.
The Food Marketing Institute (2006) Avian Influenza & Pandemic Preparedness. Arlington, VA.
Florida Department of Agriculture and Consumer Services (2008). Pandemic Influenza Agriculture Planning Toolkit. Tallahassee, FL.
Kay V., Smith B., Hoyt T. et al (2007). The Role of Emotion in Decision Making in an Avian Flu. Submitted to American Journal of Public Health.
Smith B.W., Kay V. S., Hoyt T. et al (2007) The Effects of Personality and Emotion on Behavior in a Potential Avian Flu Epidemic. 11th International Conference on Social Stress Research.
The White House (2005) National Strategy for a Pandemic Influenza. Washington, D.C.
Author information
Authors and Affiliations
Corresponding authors
Rights and permissions
Copyright information
© 2009 Springer-Verlag US
About this paper
Cite this paper
Ehlen, M.A., Bernard, M.L., Schol, A.J. (2009). Cognitive Modeling of Household Economic Behaviors during Extreme Events. In: Social Computing and Behavioral Modeling. Springer, Boston, MA. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-1-4419-0056-2_11
Download citation
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-1-4419-0056-2_11
Published:
Publisher Name: Springer, Boston, MA
Print ISBN: 978-1-4419-0055-5
Online ISBN: 978-1-4419-0056-2
eBook Packages: Computer ScienceComputer Science (R0)