Interpretations of Utility and Their Implications for the Valuation of Health
区分了体验效用和决策效用两种解释，指出基于决策效用的健康价值评估方法可能无法反映真实的体验效用，建议经济学家开发更直接测量体验效用的方法。
The term 'utility' can be interpreted in terms of the hedonic experience of an outcome (experienced utility) or in terms of the preference or desire for that outcome (decision utility). It is this second interpretation that lies at the heart of the methods that economists have developed to value non-market goods, such as health. In this article, we argue that decision utility is unlikely to generate meaningful data on the utility associated with different experiences, and instead economists should look towards developing measures that focus more directly on experienced utility. Copyright 2008 The Author(s). Journal compilation Royal Economic Society 2008.