IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/taf/jriskr/v1y1998i3p197-207.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

How information about likely accomplishments affects willingness to sacrifice to reduce global warming

Author

Listed:
  • Robert E O'Connor
  • Richard J Bord
  • Ann Fisher

Abstract

Does information on what a proposed tax or regulation is likely to accomplish affect willingness to sacrifice? The economists' perspective is that having information about what a sacrifice is 'buying' is likely to influence choices. A different perspective is that vote choices in referenda are more of a symbolic exercise, with voters adopting a heuristic toward an issue domain and the heuristic guiding the vote. This research examines the impact of providing information about what sacrifices will accomplish in the context of an issue that is poorly understood: climate change. A survey that provides information to half the sample, but not to the other half shows that providing information about what a policy action is likely to achieve does affect people's support for the policy. The percentage supporting a referendum increases (holding constant the 'price') when information is provided that appears to imply a 'substantial' achievement. At least for the sacrifices identified, information about 'small' achievements either leads to no change or actually decreases willingness to sacrifice. Logistic models of determinants of willingness to sacrifice offer additional support for the contention that people differentiate rather than decide based upon a general environmental heuristic. Across the different referenda, different factors predict peoples' choices.

Suggested Citation

  • Robert E O'Connor & Richard J Bord & Ann Fisher, 1998. "How information about likely accomplishments affects willingness to sacrifice to reduce global warming," Journal of Risk Research, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 1(3), pages 197-207, July.
    • Handle: RePEc:taf:jriskr:v:1:y:1998:i:3:p:197-207
    DOI: 10.1080/136698798377123
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://hdl.handle.net/10.1080/136698798377123
    Download Restriction: Access to full text is restricted to subscribers.
    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.1080/136698798377123?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. Carson, Richard T. & Hanemann, W. Michael & Kopp, Raymond J. & Krosnick, Jon A. & Mitchell, Robert C. & Presser, Stanley & Ruud, Paul A. & Smith, V. Kerry & Conaway, Michael & Martin, Kerry, 1996. "Was the NOAA Panel Correct about Contingent Valuation?," Discussion Papers 10503, Resources for the Future.
    2. Ajzen, Icek & Brown, Thomas C. & Rosenthal, Lori H., 1996. "Information Bias in Contingent Valuation: Effects of Personal Relevance, Quality of Information, and Motivational Orientation," Journal of Environmental Economics and Management, Elsevier, vol. 30(1), pages 43-57, January.
    3. Everett Carll Ladd & Karlyn Bowman, 1995. "Attitudes Toward the Environment: Twenty-Five Years After Earth Day," Books, American Enterprise Institute, number 53548, September.
    4. Kahneman, Daniel & Knetsch, Jack L., 1992. "Valuing public goods: The purchase of moral satisfaction," Journal of Environmental Economics and Management, Elsevier, vol. 22(1), pages 57-70, January.
    5. Fischhoff, Baruch & Furby, Lita, 1988. "Measuring Values: A Conceptual Framework for Interpreting Transactions with Special Reference to Contingent Valuation of Visibility," Journal of Risk and Uncertainty, Springer, vol. 1(2), pages 147-184, June.
    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. Mizue Ohe & Saburo Ikeda, 2005. "Global Warming: Risk Perception and Risk-Mitigating Behavior in Japan," Mitigation and Adaptation Strategies for Global Change, Springer, vol. 10(2), pages 221-236, April.
    2. Branden B. Johnson & Brendon Swedlow, 2021. "Cultural Theory's Contributions to Risk Analysis: A Thematic Review with Directions and Resources for Further Research," Risk Analysis, John Wiley & Sons, vol. 41(3), pages 429-455, March.
    3. Jason Kinnell & Jeffrey K. Lazo & Donald J. Epp & JaAnn Fisher & James S. Shortle, 2002. "Perceptions and Values for Preventing Ecosystem Change: Pennsylvania Duck Hunters and the Prairie Pothole Region," Land Economics, University of Wisconsin Press, vol. 78(2), pages 228-244.

    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. Turpie, Jane K., 2003. "The existence value of biodiversity in South Africa: how interest, experience, knowledge, income and perceived level of threat influence local willingness to pay," Ecological Economics, Elsevier, vol. 46(2), pages 199-216, September.
    2. John C. Whitehead & Timothy C. Haab & Ju‐Chin Huang, 1998. "Part‐Whole Bias in Contingent Valuation: Will Scope Effects Be Detected with Inexpensive Survey Methods?," Southern Economic Journal, John Wiley & Sons, vol. 65(1), pages 160-168, July.
    3. Clem Tisdell & Clevo Wilson, 2006. "Information, Wildlife Valuation, Conservation: Experiments And Policy," Contemporary Economic Policy, Western Economic Association International, vol. 24(1), pages 144-159, January.
    4. Nyborg, Karine, 2000. "Homo Economicus and Homo Politicus: interpretation and aggregation of environmental values," Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, Elsevier, vol. 42(3), pages 305-322, July.
    5. Samiran Banerjee & James Murphy, 2005. "The scope test revisited," Applied Economics Letters, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 12(10), pages 613-617.
    6. McDaniels, Timothy L. & Roessler, Craig, 1998. "Multiattribute elicitation of wilderness preservation benefits: a constructive approach," Ecological Economics, Elsevier, vol. 27(3), pages 299-312, December.
    7. Clark, Judy & Burgess, Jacquelin & Harrison, Carolyn M., 2000. ""I struggled with this money business": respondents' perspectives on contingent valuation," Ecological Economics, Elsevier, vol. 33(1), pages 45-62, April.
    8. Veisten, Knut, 2007. "Contingent valuation controversies: Philosophic debates about economic theory," Journal of Behavioral and Experimental Economics (formerly The Journal of Socio-Economics), Elsevier, vol. 36(2), pages 204-232, April.
    9. Sagoff, M., 1998. "Aggregation and deliberation in valuing environmental public goods:: A look beyond contingent pricing," Ecological Economics, Elsevier, vol. 24(2-3), pages 213-230, February.
    10. Hoehn, John P. & Randall, Alan, 2002. "The effect of resource quality information on resource injury perceptions and contingent values," Resource and Energy Economics, Elsevier, vol. 24(1-2), pages 13-31, February.
    11. Richard T. Carson, 2011. "Contingent Valuation," Books, Edward Elgar Publishing, number 2489.
    12. Taale, Francis & Kyeremeh, Christian, 2016. "Households׳ willingness to pay for reliable electricity services in Ghana," Renewable and Sustainable Energy Reviews, Elsevier, vol. 62(C), pages 280-288.
    13. Wiser, Ryan H., 2007. "Using contingent valuation to explore willingness to pay for renewable energy: A comparison of collective and voluntary payment vehicles," Ecological Economics, Elsevier, vol. 62(3-4), pages 419-432, May.
    14. Joni Hersch & W. Kip Viscusi, 2005. "The Generational Divide in Support for Environmental Policies: European Evidence," NBER Working Papers 11859, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    15. Tisdell, Clement A., 2003. "Influences of Knowledge of Wildlife Species on Patterns of Willingness to pay for their Conservation," Economics, Ecology and Environment Working Papers 48972, University of Queensland, School of Economics.
    16. Clive L Spash, 2008. "The Contingent Valuation Method: Retrospect and Prospect," Socio-Economics and the Environment in Discussion (SEED) Working Paper Series 2008-04, CSIRO Sustainable Ecosystems.
    17. Abiodun Olusola Omotayo & Peter Tshepiso Ndhlovu & Seleke Christopher Tshwene & Kehinde Oluseyi Olagunju & Adeyemi Oladapo Aremu, 2021. "Determinants of Household Income and Willingness to Pay for Indigenous Plants in North West Province, South Africa: A Two-Stage Heckman Approach," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 13(10), pages 1-18, May.
    18. Carson, Richard T., 1998. "Valuation of tropical rainforests: philosophical and practical issues in the use of contingent valuation," Ecological Economics, Elsevier, vol. 24(1), pages 15-29, January.
    19. Svedsater, Henrik, 2000. "Contingent valuation of global environmental resources: Test of perfect and regular embedding," Journal of Economic Psychology, Elsevier, vol. 21(6), pages 605-623, December.
    20. Lopez-Becerra, E.I. & Alcon, F., 2021. "Social desirability bias in the environmental economic valuation: An inferred valuation approach," Ecological Economics, Elsevier, vol. 184(C).

    More about this item

    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:taf:jriskr:v:1:y:1998:i:3:p:197-207. 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: Chris Longhurst (email available below). General contact details of provider: http://www.tandfonline.com/RJRR20 .

    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.