IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/eee/ecolec/v99y2014icp74-87.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Determinants of conservation among the rural poor: A charitable contribution experiment

Author

Listed:
  • Karapetyan, Deanna
  • d'Adda, Giovanna

Abstract

This paper examines how conservation decisions are affected by environmental degradation. Donations to an environmental NGO and participation in actual conservation activities capture individual preferences for environmental conservation. Environmental degradation is measured both through survey-based data on experiences of deforestation and environmental shocks, and through indices of deforestation constructed with GIS data. The results show that being exposed to environmental degradation is correlated both with higher donations and conservation behavior. The relationship between conservation choices and individual social preferences is also explored. Experimental measures of individual altruism and inequality aversion, and survey measures of trust, time preferences and civic engagement are correlated with donations and real world conservation decisions respectively. These findings show the role of environmental awareness in fostering environmental conservation even in very poor settings. They also highlight the potential of experiments, which closely mirror real world decisions, to generate conclusions generalizable to individual behavior outside the laboratory.

Suggested Citation

  • Karapetyan, Deanna & d'Adda, Giovanna, 2014. "Determinants of conservation among the rural poor: A charitable contribution experiment," Ecological Economics, Elsevier, vol. 99(C), pages 74-87.
    • Handle: RePEc:eee:ecolec:v:99:y:2014:i:c:p:74-87
    DOI: 10.1016/j.ecolecon.2014.01.009
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0921800914000135
    Download Restriction: Full text for ScienceDirect subscribers only
    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.1016/j.ecolecon.2014.01.009?utm_source=ideas
    LibKey link: if access is restricted and if your library uses this service, LibKey will redirect you to where you can use your library subscription to access this item
    ---><---

    As the access to this document is restricted, you may want to search for a different version of it.

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Agrawal, Arun, 2001. "Common Property Institutions and Sustainable Governance of Resources," World Development, Elsevier, vol. 29(10), pages 1649-1672, October.
    2. Glenn W. Harrison & John A. List, 2004. "Field Experiments," Journal of Economic Literature, American Economic Association, vol. 42(4), pages 1009-1055, December.
    3. Jumbe, Charles B.L. & Angelsen, Arild, 2007. "Forest dependence and participation in CPR management: Empirical evidence from forest co-management in Malawi," Ecological Economics, Elsevier, vol. 62(3-4), pages 661-672, May.
    4. d'Adda, Giovanna, 2011. "Motivation crowding in environmental protection: Evidence from an artefactual field experiment," Ecological Economics, Elsevier, vol. 70(11), pages 2083-2097, September.
    5. Goeree, Jacob K. & Holt, Charles A. & Laury, Susan K., 2002. "Private costs and public benefits: unraveling the effects of altruism and noisy behavior," Journal of Public Economics, Elsevier, vol. 83(2), pages 255-276, February.
    6. d'Adda, Giovanna, 2011. "Social Status and Influence: Evidence from an Artefactual Field Experiment on Local Public Good Provision," Proceedings of the German Development Economics Conference, Berlin 2011 22, Verein für Socialpolitik, Research Committee Development Economics.
    7. A. Colin Cameron & Douglas L. Miller, 2010. "Robust Inference with Clustered Data," Working Papers 318, University of California, Davis, Department of Economics.
    8. A. Colin Cameron & Douglas L. Miller, 2010. "Robust Inference with Clustered Data," Working Papers 107, University of California, Davis, Department of Economics.
    9. Michael Kremer & Jessica Leino & Edward Miguel & Alix Peterson Zwane, 2011. "Spring Cleaning: Rural Water Impacts, Valuation, and Property Rights Institutions," The Quarterly Journal of Economics, President and Fellows of Harvard College, vol. 126(1), pages 145-205.
    10. Maarten Voors & Erwin Bulte & Andreas Kontoleon & John A. List & Ty Turley, 2011. "Using Artefactual Field Experiments to Learn about the Incentives for Sustainable Forest Use in Developing Economies," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 101(3), pages 329-333, May.
    11. Narayan, Deepa, 1999. "Bonds and bridges : social and poverty," Policy Research Working Paper Series 2167, The World Bank.
    12. Gachter, Simon & Herrmann, Benedikt & Thoni, Christian, 2004. "Trust, voluntary cooperation, and socio-economic background: survey and experimental evidence," Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, Elsevier, vol. 55(4), pages 505-531, December.
    13. Rob A. Cramb, 2005. "Social capital and soil conservation: evidence from the Philippines," Australian Journal of Agricultural and Resource Economics, Australian Agricultural and Resource Economics Society, vol. 49(2), pages 211-226, June.
    14. repec:feb:artefa:0101 is not listed on IDEAS
    15. James Andreoni & William Harbaugh & Lise Vesterlund, 2003. "The Carrot or the Stick: Rewards, Punishments, and Cooperation," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 93(3), pages 893-902, June.
    16. Sir Nicholas Stern, 2006. "What is the Economics of Climate Change?," World Economics, World Economics, 1 Ivory Square, Plantation Wharf, London, United Kingdom, SW11 3UE, vol. 7(2), pages 1-10, April.
    17. Wade, Robert, 1987. "The Management of Common Property Resources: Collective Action as an Alternative to Privatisation or State Regulation," Cambridge Journal of Economics, Oxford University Press, vol. 11(2), pages 95-106, June.
    18. Holden, Stein T. & Shiferaw, Bekele & Wik, Mette, 1998. "Poverty, market imperfections and time preferences: of relevance for environmental policy?," Environment and Development Economics, Cambridge University Press, vol. 3(1), pages 105-130, February.
    19. Becker, Gary S, 1976. "Altruism, Egoism, and Genetic Fitness: Economics and Sociobiology," Journal of Economic Literature, American Economic Association, vol. 14(3), pages 817-826, September.
    20. E. Ostrom, 2010. "A Behavioral Approach to the Rational Choice Theory of Collective Action Presidential Address, American political Science Association, 1997," Public administration issues, Higher School of Economics, issue 1, pages 5-52.
    21. Bouma, Jetske & Bulte, Erwin & van Soest, Daan, 2008. "Trust and cooperation: Social capital and community resource management," Journal of Environmental Economics and Management, Elsevier, vol. 56(2), pages 155-166, September.
    22. Nankhuni, Flora J. & Findeis, Jill L., 2004. "Natural resource-collection work and children's schooling in Malawi," Agricultural Economics, Blackwell, vol. 31(2-3), pages 123-134, December.
    23. Bardhan, Pranab, 2000. "Irrigation and Cooperation: An Empirical Analysis of 48 Irrigation Communities in South India," Economic Development and Cultural Change, University of Chicago Press, vol. 48(4), pages 847-865, July.
    24. Gibson, Clark C. & Williams, John T. & Ostrom, Elinor, 2005. "Local Enforcement and Better Forests," World Development, Elsevier, vol. 33(2), pages 273-284, February.
    25. Mendelsohn, Robert & Dinar, Ariel & Williams, Larry, 2006. "The distributional impact of climate change on rich and poor countries," Environment and Development Economics, Cambridge University Press, vol. 11(2), pages 159-178, April.
    26. Moseley, William G., 2001. "African evidence on the relation of poverty, time preference and the environment," Ecological Economics, Elsevier, vol. 38(3), pages 317-326, September.
    27. Ernst Fehr & Helen Bernhard & Bettina Rockenbach, 2008. "Egalitarianism in young children," Nature, Nature, vol. 454(7208), pages 1079-1083, August.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Citations

    Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
    as


    Cited by:

    1. Estifanos, Tafesse Kefyalew & Polyakov, Maksym & Pandit, Ram & Hailu, Atakelty & Burton, Michael, 2020. "Managing conflicts between local land use and the protection of the Ethiopian wolf: Residents’ preferences for conservation program design features," Ecological Economics, Elsevier, vol. 169(C).
    2. IGEI Kengo & KUROKAWA Hirofumi & ISEKI Masato & KITSUKI Akinori & KURITA Kenichi & MANAGI Shunsuke & NAKAMURO Makiko & SAKANO Akira, 2022. "Nudges to Increase the Effectiveness of Environmental Education: New evidence from a field experiment," Discussion papers 22111, Research Institute of Economy, Trade and Industry (RIETI).
    3. Heinz, Nicolai & Koessler, Ann-Kathrin, 2021. "Other-regarding preferences and pro-environmental behaviour: An interdisciplinary review of experimental studies," Ecological Economics, Elsevier, vol. 184(C).
    4. Caterina Giannetti & Pietro Guarnieri & Tommaso Luzzati, 2021. "Pro-environmental attitude and behaviours: an investigation on the role of pro-sociality," Discussion Papers 2021/269, Dipartimento di Economia e Management (DEM), University of Pisa, Pisa, Italy.
    5. Francesco Bogliacino & Laura Jiménez & Gianluca Grimalda, 2015. "Consultative, Democracy and Trust," Documentos de Trabajo, Escuela de Economía 12696, Universidad Nacional de Colombia, FCE, CID.
    6. Feng Wang & Jian Yang & Joshua Shackman & Xin Liu, 2021. "Impact of Income Inequality on Urban Air Quality: A Game Theoretical and Empirical Study in China," IJERPH, MDPI, vol. 18(16), pages 1-17, August.
    7. Bogliacino, Francesco & Jiménez Lozano, Laura & Grimalda, Gianluca, 2018. "Consultative democracy and trust11We thank Vanessa Carrillo, Jairo Paéz and Daniel Reyes for their help during the experiments. A special thanks to Franci Beltrán, Jairo Paéz and Alfonso Peña for prov," Structural Change and Economic Dynamics, Elsevier, vol. 44(C), pages 55-67.
    8. Bogliacino, Francesco & Grimalda, Gianluca & Jimenez, Laura, 2017. "Consultative Democracy & Trust," MPRA Paper 82138, University Library of Munich, Germany.

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Matteo M. Galizzi & Daniel Navarro-Martinez, 2019. "On the External Validity of Social Preference Games: A Systematic Lab-Field Study," Management Science, INFORMS, vol. 65(3), pages 976-1002, March.
    2. Juan Camilo Cardenas & Jeffrey Carpenter, 2008. "Behavioural Development Economics: Lessons from Field Labs in the Developing World," Journal of Development Studies, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 44(3), pages 311-338.
    3. Sandra Polania-Reyes, 2016. "Disentangling Social Capital: Lab-in-the-Field Evidence on Coordination, Networks, and Cooperation," Artefactual Field Experiments 00565, The Field Experiments Website.
    4. Jon Anderson & Stephen Burks & Jeffrey Carpenter & Lorenz Götte & Karsten Maurer & Daniele Nosenzo & Ruth Potter & Kim Rocha & Aldo Rustichini, 2013. "Self-selection and variations in the laboratory measurement of other-regarding preferences across subject pools: evidence from one college student and two adult samples," Experimental Economics, Springer;Economic Science Association, vol. 16(2), pages 170-189, June.
    5. Okumu, Boscow & Muchapondwa, Edwin, 2020. "Determinants of successful collective management of forest resources: Evidence from Kenyan Community Forest Associations," Forest Policy and Economics, Elsevier, vol. 113(C).
    6. Janssens, Wendy, 2010. "Women's Empowerment and the Creation of Social Capital in Indian Villages," World Development, Elsevier, vol. 38(7), pages 974-988, July.
    7. Meier, Stephan & Pierce, Lamar & Vaccaro, Antonino & La Cara, Barbara, 2016. "Trust and in-group favoritism in a culture of crime," Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, Elsevier, vol. 132(PA), pages 78-92.
    8. Bouma, Jetske A. & Joy, K.J. & Paranjape, Suhas & Ansink, Erik, 2014. "The Influence of Legitimacy Perceptions on Cooperation – A Framed Field Experiment," World Development, Elsevier, vol. 57(C), pages 127-137.
    9. Bouma, Jetske & Ansink, Erik, 2013. "The role of legitimacy perceptions in self-restricted resource use: A framed field experiment," Forest Policy and Economics, Elsevier, vol. 37(C), pages 84-93.
    10. Anderies, John M. & Janssen, Marco A. & Bousquet, François & Cardenas, Juan-Camilo & Castillo, Daniel & Lopez, Maria-Claudio & Tobias, Robert & Vollan, Björn & Wutich, Amber, 2011. "The challenge of understanding decisions in experimental studies of common pool resource governance," Ecological Economics, Elsevier, vol. 70(9), pages 1571-1579, July.
    11. Meier, Stephan & Pierce, Lamar & Vaccaro, Antonino, 2014. "Trust and In-Group Favoritism in a Culture of Crime," IZA Discussion Papers 8169, Institute of Labor Economics (IZA).
    12. Takayama, Taisuke & Matsuda, Hirotaka & Nakatani, Tomoaki, 2018. "The determinants of collective action in irrigation management systems: Evidence from rural communities in Japan," Agricultural Water Management, Elsevier, vol. 206(C), pages 113-123.
    13. Kocher, Martin & Martinsson, Peter & Visser, Martine, 2012. "Social background, cooperative behavior, and norm enforcement," Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, Elsevier, vol. 81(2), pages 341-354.
    14. Wang, Yahua & Chen, Chunliang & Araral, Eduardo, 2016. "The Effects of Migration on Collective Action in the Commons: Evidence from Rural China," World Development, Elsevier, vol. 88(C), pages 79-93.
    15. Juan Camilo Cardenas & Jeffrey P. Carpenter, 2005. "Experiments and Economic Development: Lessons from Field Labs in the Developing World," Middlebury College Working Paper Series 0505, Middlebury College, Department of Economics.
    16. Pfaff, Alexander & Vélez, Maria Alejandra & Ramos, Pablo Andres & Molina, Adriana, 2015. "Framed field experiment on resource scarcity & extraction: Path-dependent generosity within sequential water appropriation," Ecological Economics, Elsevier, vol. 120(C), pages 416-429.
    17. Giovanna d’Adda, 2012. "Leadership and influence: Evidence from an artefactual field experiment on local public good provision," ECON - Working Papers 059, Department of Economics - University of Zurich.
    18. Shrestha, Sujata & Shrestha, Uttam Babu, 2017. "Beyond money: Does REDD+ payment enhance household's participation in forest governance and management in Nepal's community forests?," Forest Policy and Economics, Elsevier, vol. 80(C), pages 63-70.
    19. Poteete, Amy R. & Ostrom, Elinor, 2008. "Fifteen Years of Empirical Research on Collective Action in Natural Resource Management: Struggling to Build Large-N Databases Based on Qualitative Research," World Development, Elsevier, vol. 36(1), pages 176-195, January.
    20. Goeschl, Timo & Kettner, Sara Elisa & Lohse, Johannes & Schwieren, Christiane, 2020. "How much can we learn about voluntary climate action from behavior in public goods games?," Ecological Economics, Elsevier, vol. 171(C).

    More about this item

    Keywords

    Cooperative games; Field experiments; Microeconomic analyses of economic development; Development planning and policy; Renewable resources and conservation; Sierra Leone;
    All these keywords.

    JEL classification:

    • C71 - Mathematical and Quantitative Methods - - Game Theory and Bargaining Theory - - - Cooperative Games
    • C93 - Mathematical and Quantitative Methods - - Design of Experiments - - - Field Experiments
    • O12 - Economic Development, Innovation, Technological Change, and Growth - - Economic Development - - - Microeconomic Analyses of Economic Development
    • O20 - Economic Development, Innovation, Technological Change, and Growth - - Development Planning and Policy - - - General
    • Q20 - Agricultural and Natural Resource Economics; Environmental and Ecological Economics - - Renewable Resources and Conservation - - - General

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:eee:ecolec:v:99:y:2014:i:c:p:74-87. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Catherine Liu (email available below). General contact details of provider: http://www.elsevier.com/locate/ecolecon .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.