Let's not tempt fate: the influence of future time-orientation, fatalism, and superstition on willingness to report expectations about future health

Abstract

This article examines individuals' likelihood of engaging in future health prediction as a function of their fatalism, future time orientation, superstition, and history of chronic disease. Using a multistage cluster sample of 33 urban cities in Turkey, we asked respondents (N = 1,467), to report their past and current health and predict their future (expected) health status (i.e., future self-rated health). While less than 1% failed to report past or current health, 23% of respondents provided no prediction for their future health status. We employed a moderated-mediation analysis to identify the predictors of this avoidance of reporting future health status expectations. Our analyses point to two potentially distinct mechanisms influencing individuals' likelihood of providing future self-rated health. First, individuals suffering from a chronic disease were more likely to have higher fatalism, which, in turn, decreased their likelihood of providing a rating for their future health. Second, more superstitious individuals were less likely to report expectations about future health. This association was moderated by future time orientation such that for individuals with higher future time orientation (vs. present time orientation), higher superstition was associated with a steeper increase in the probability of avoidance of future health predictions. This finding suggests that some individuals might avoid sharing predictions about their future health because they fear talking about future outcomes can invite negative outcomes by "tempting fate."