In three essays, consumers’ insurance decision making is studied in the context of product warranty. In the first essay, we establish a new phenomenon that consumers hold different insurance intention for different brands of similar products. We propose behavioral explanations and a general utility framework to account for the phenomenon. In the second essay, there is accumulating evidence of extreme risk aversion implied from consumers’ insurance choices. We propose and test a new explanation to the phenomenon. In the third essay, the insurance literature often found positive correlation between risk perception and coverage but not between actual risk and coverage, contradicting the game theoretical prediction. We identify a new behavioral tendency consumers often commit and argue this...[ Read more ]

In three essays, consumers’ insurance decision making is studied in the context of product warranty. In the first essay, we establish a new phenomenon that consumers hold different insurance intention for different brands of similar products. We propose behavioral explanations and a general utility framework to account for the phenomenon. In the second essay, there is accumulating evidence of extreme risk aversion implied from consumers’ insurance choices. We propose and test a new explanation to the phenomenon. In the third essay, the insurance literature often found positive correlation between risk perception and coverage but not between actual risk and coverage, contradicting the game theoretical prediction. We identify a new behavioral tendency consumers often commit and argue this may be an explanation to the empirical results found in the insurance literature.