BACKGROUND
On average, individuals underestimate their survival chances, which could yield suboptimal long-term decisions.

OBJECTIVE
Is the accuracy of individuals’ survival beliefs associated with their knowledge of population life expectancy of people of their age and gender?

METHODS
We use the 1995 and 1996 waves of the Dutch DNB Household Survey (DHS) with data on individuals’ survival beliefs and their knowledge of population life expectancy, supplemented with death registry data for the years 1995 to 2018. The accuracy of their survival beliefs is measured by comparing these beliefs with (actual) survival during the years after the survey was conducted. We provide prima facie evidence on the association between individuals’ knowledge of population life expectancy and the accuracy of their survival beliefs, and quantify this association using mortality risk models that control for socioeconomic status and health-related characteristics.

RESULTS
Individuals with only some over- or underestimation of population life expectancy had, on average, about a one-third smaller difference between their survival beliefs and survival rate than those who severely underestimated population life expectancy. In line with this prima facie evidence, we find that, after controlling for socioeconomic and health characteristics, 55-year-old individuals with one-year of better knowledge of population life expectancy underestimated their lifetime with, on average, about 0.3 years less (95% CI: 0.09–0.52).



中文翻译：

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个体生存信念的准确性是否与其对人口预期寿命的了解有关？（由 Adriaan Kalwij，Vesile Kutlu Koc）

背景
平均而言，个人低估了他们的生存机会，这可能会产生次优的长期决策。

目标
个体生存信念的准确性是否与他们对其年龄和性别的人口预期寿命的了解有关？

方法
我们使用了 1995 年和 1996 年荷兰 DNB 家庭调查 (DHS) 的数据，其中包含个人生存信念和他们对人口预期寿命知识的数据，并辅以 1995 年至 2018 年的死亡登记数据。他们的生存信念的准确性是通过将这些信念与进行调查后几年内的（实际）生存率进行比较来衡量。我们提供了关于个人对人口预期寿命的了解与其生存信念的准确性之间关联的初步证据，并使用控制社会经济地位和健康相关特征的死亡风险模型来量化这种关联。

结果
与那些严重低估人口预期寿命的人相比，那些仅仅高估或低估了人口预期寿命的人，其生存信念和存活率之间的差异平均要小三分之一左右。与这一初步证据一致，我们发现，在控制社会经济和健康特征后，对人口预期寿命有更好了解的 55 岁个体平均低估了自己的寿命约 0.3 年。 95% 置信区间：0.09–0.52）。