Journal of Risk and Uncertainty (journal-of-risk-and-uncertainty)

Journal positioning

The Journal of Risk and Uncertainty is the leading specialist journal on decision-making under risk and uncertainty. It publishes work on expected utility and its alternatives, ambiguity, behavioral decision theory, and the valuation of risks to life and health — spanning economics, psychology, and decision science. What wins here is a paper that advances how we model or measure choice under risk: a new theory of preferences, a clean test discriminating among models, or a credible valuation of risk. The readership is decision theorists, risk-and-insurance economists, and behavioral researchers.

This skill is a fit / venue-selection / re-framing tool. It does not replace the journal's current official submission guidelines. Before submitting, re-check the live author instructions on the Springer / journal site and the submission system.

When to trigger

• The author names JRU as the target venue.
• A paper on risk preferences, ambiguity, or risk valuation needs a specialist decision-science home.
• A behavioral or experimental paper centers on choice under risk/uncertainty and needs re-framing toward the decision-theory contribution.
• The author needs JRU's desk-reject risks and a credible decision-science / behavioral alternative list.

Scope & topic fit

• Expected utility theory and non-expected-utility alternatives (prospect theory, rank-dependent, etc.); axiomatic and behavioral models of risk preference.
• Ambiguity and decision under uncertainty: models, measurement, and experimental tests.
• Behavioral decision theory: framing, probability weighting, reference dependence, and anomalies.
• Valuation of risk, including value of statistical life, health and mortality risk, and risk-related insurance and policy questions.

Method & evidence bar

• Theory must be precise and decision-theoretically grounded; new preference models need clear axioms or testable structure, not loose stories.
• Experimental work needs clean design that genuinely discriminates among competing models, with proper incentives and inference.
• Empirical valuation needs credible identification and careful measurement of risk and willingness-to-pay.
• The contribution must be about decision-making under risk/uncertainty specifically, not a generic behavioral or applied result.

Structure & house style

• The introduction should state the decision-theoretic question, what existing models miss, and how the paper resolves or tests it.
• Frame the contribution as a model, a discriminating test, or a valuation advance — situate it among the standard risk-preference models.
• Use an abstract and (where applicable) JEL codes; relegate proofs, instructions, and robustness to appendices.
• Exhibits should make the model comparison or valuation legible, with clear treatment of incentives and parameter estimates.

Official-submission checklist

• Before giving submission-ready advice, read ../../resources/source-basis.md and ../../resources/official-source-map.md; start from the official source anchors for this journal family, then cite the current journal-specific page you checked.
• Search the live site for "Journal of Risk and Uncertainty submission guidelines / instructions for authors" and follow the current Springer version.
• Re-check word/figure limits, abstract and JEL/keyword requirements, reference style, anonymization expectations, and disclosure.
• Re-check the current data and code availability policy, experimental-materials / pre-registration expectations, and ethics approval for human-subjects experiments.
• If the live official instructions conflict with this skill, the official instructions win.

Pre-submission self-check

• One sentence stating how this advances modeling or measurement of choice under risk/uncertainty.
• The contribution is stated as a preference model / discriminating test / valuation, not as a significant effect.
• The design genuinely discriminates among competing risk models or credibly identifies a valuation.
• Incentives, inference, ethics, and experimental materials meet current standards.
• The paper is centrally about risk/uncertainty, not generic behavioral economics.

Common desk-reject triggers

• A generic behavioral or applied paper with no specific decision-under-risk contribution.
• A new "anomaly" demonstration that does not discriminate among existing models or advance theory.
• An experiment with weak incentives, confounded design, or no model-testing payoff.
• A valuation study with no credible identification of the risk–WTP relationship.

Re-routing decision

• Broad behavioral / institutional / experimental economics → journal-of-economic-behavior-and-organization.
• Decision-theoretic results aimed at general theory audiences → journal-of-economic-theory or games-and-economic-behavior.
• Risk valuation as health policy → journal-of-health-economics; as public policy → journal-of-public-economics.
• Finance-risk / asset-pricing framing → journal-of-finance.

Output format

[Fit] High / Medium / Low (one-line reason)
[Target] Journal of Risk and Uncertainty
[Topic tags] <2–3 closest topics>
[Method/evidence] <does the decision-under-risk contribution clear this venue's bar?>
[Top risk] <the single most likely reason for rejection>
[Official items to re-check] <submission system / JEL-keywords / data-code / pre-registration / ethics>
[Re-route suggestion] <if not a fit, a better-matched venue>