Reminders of money increase patient empowerment

Abstract

The passage of price transparency legislation in the US combined with efforts to enhance the customer experience suggest that patients are more likely to encounter reminders of money when thinking about and making healthcare decisions. Because money is symbolically and empirically associated with empowerment, we propose that money reminders in the healthcare domain will increase patient empowerment. Across three experiments, we find that reminding people of money increases patient empowerment, as indicated by an established patient empowerment scale (Study 1), heightened desire for autonomy when making healthcare decisions (Study 2), and greater reactance to imagining a doctor's refusal to prescribe a requested drug (Study 3). We show that this effect is attenuated when the health condition is serious (as opposed to minor).