Advanced Search
MyIDEAS: Login

Testing construct validity of verbal versus numerical measures of preference uncertainty in contingent valuation

Contents:

Author Info

  • Akter, Sonia
  • Bennett, Jeffrey W.

Abstract

The numerical certainty scale (NCS) and polychotomous choice (PC) methods are two widely used techniques for measuring preference uncertainty in contingent valuation (CV) studies. The NCS follows a numerical scale and the PC is based on a verbal scale. This report presents results of two experiments that use these preference uncertainty measurement techniques. The first experiment was designed to compare and contrast the uncertainty scores obtained from the NCS and the PC method. The second experiment was conducted to test a preference uncertainty measurement scale that combines verbal expressions with numerical and graphical interpretations: a composite certainty scale (CCS). The construct validity of the certainty scores obtained from these three techniques was tested by estimating three separate ordered probit regression models. The results of the study can be summarised in three key findings. First, the PC method generates a higher proportion of ‘yes’ responses than the conventional dichotomous choice elicitation format. Second, the CCS method generates a significantly higher proportion of certain responses than the NCS and the PC methods. Finally, the NCS method performs poorly in terms of construct validity. Overall, the verbal measures perform better than the numerical measure. The CCS is a promising method to measure preference uncertainty in CV studies. To better understand its strengths and weaknesses however, further empirical applications are needed.

Download Info

If you experience problems downloading a file, check if you have the proper application to view it first. In case of further problems read the IDEAS help page. Note that these files are not on the IDEAS site. Please be patient as the files may be large.
File URL: http://purl.umn.edu/94942
Download Restriction: no

Bibliographic Info

Paper provided by Australian National University, Environmental Economics Research Hub in its series Research Reports with number 94942.

as in new window
Length:
Date of creation: Jan 2010
Date of revision:
Handle: RePEc:ags:eerhrr:94942

Contact details of provider:
Postal: Crawford Building, Lennox Crossing, Building #132, Canberra ACT 0200
Phone: +61 2 6125 4705
Fax: +61 2 6125 5448
Email:
Web page: http://www.crawford.anu.edu.au/research_units/eerh/
More information through EDIRC

Related research

Keywords: preference uncertainty; contingent valuation; numerical certainty scale; polychotomous choice method; composite certainty scale; climate change; Australia.; Environmental Economics and Policy; Research Methods/ Statistical Methods; Q51; Q54;

Other versions of this item:

Find related papers by JEL classification:

This paper has been announced in the following NEP Reports:

References

References listed on IDEAS
Please report citation or reference errors to , or , if you are the registered author of the cited work, log in to your RePEc Author Service profile, click on "citations" and make appropriate adjustments.:
as in new window
  1. Akter, Sonia & Brouwer, Roy & Brander, Luke & van Beukering, Pieter, 2009. "Respondent uncertainty in a contingent market for carbon offsets," Ecological Economics, Elsevier, vol. 68(6), pages 1858-1863, April.
Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

Citations

Lists

This item is not listed on Wikipedia, on a reading list or among the top items on IDEAS.

Statistics

Access and download statistics

Corrections

When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:ags:eerhrr:94942

For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: (AgEcon Search).

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 references are entirely missing, you can add them using this form.

If the full references list an item that is present in RePEc, but the system did not link 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 profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

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