IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/p/iza/izadps/dp13915.html
   My bibliography  Save this paper

Economic Preferences and Obesity: Evidence from a Clinical Lab-in-Field Experiment

Author

Listed:
  • Pastore, Chiara

    (University of York)

  • Schurer, Stefanie

    (University of Sydney)

  • Tymula, Agnieszka

    (University of Sydney)

  • Fuller, Nicholas

    (University of Sydney)

  • Caterson, Ian

    (University of Sydney)

Abstract

We study economic decision-making of 284 people with obesity and pre-diabetes who participated in a 6-months randomised controlled trial to control weight and prevent diabetes. To elicit preferences, we use incentive-compatible experimental tasks that participants completed during their medical screening examination. We find that, on average, participants are risk averse, show no evidence of present bias, and have impatience levels comparable to healthy samples described in the international literature. Variations in present bias and impatience are not significantly associated with variations in markers of obesity. But we find a significant negative association between risk tolerance and BMI and other markers of obesity for women. A 1 standard deviation increase in risk tolerance is associated with a 0.2 standard deviation drop in BMI and waist circumference. Impatience moderates the link between risk tolerance and obesity. We replicate the key finding of interaction effects between risk and time preferences using survey data from a nationally representative sample of 6,281 Australians with similar characteristics. Deviating markedly from the literature, we conclude that risk tolerance brings benefits for health outcomes if combined with patience in this understudied but highly policy-relevant population.

Suggested Citation

  • Pastore, Chiara & Schurer, Stefanie & Tymula, Agnieszka & Fuller, Nicholas & Caterson, Ian, 2020. "Economic Preferences and Obesity: Evidence from a Clinical Lab-in-Field Experiment," IZA Discussion Papers 13915, Institute of Labor Economics (IZA).
    • Handle: RePEc:iza:izadps:dp13915
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://docs.iza.org/dp13915.pdf
    Download Restriction: no
    ---><---

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Bart H.H. Golsteyn & Hans Grönqvist & Lena Lindahl, 2014. "Adolescent Time Preferences Predict Lifetime Outcomes," Economic Journal, Royal Economic Society, vol. 124(580), pages 739-761, November.
    2. Erik Hanushek & Stephen Machin & Ludger Woessmann (ed.), 2011. "Handbook of the Economics of Education," Handbook of the Economics of Education, Elsevier, edition 1, volume 4, number 4, June.
    3. Andersen, Steffen & Harrison, Glenn W. & Lau, Morten I. & Rutström, E. Elisabet, 2014. "Discounting behavior: A reconsideration," European Economic Review, Elsevier, vol. 71(C), pages 15-33.
    4. Brown, Heather & Biosca, Olga, 2016. "Exploring the relationship between time preference, body fatness, and educational attainment," Social Science & Medicine, Elsevier, vol. 158(C), pages 75-85.
    5. Matthias Sutter & Martin G. Kocher & Daniela Glätzle-Rützler & Stefan T. Trautmann, 2013. "Impatience and Uncertainty: Experimental Decisions Predict Adolescents' Field Behavior," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 103(1), pages 510-531, February.
    6. Takagi, Daisuke & Kondo, Naoki & Takada, Misato & Hashimoto, Hideki, 2016. "Educational attainment, time preference, and health-related behaviors: A mediation analysis from the J-SHINE survey," Social Science & Medicine, Elsevier, vol. 153(C), pages 116-122.
    7. Ned Augenblick & Muriel Niederle & Charles Sprenger, 2015. "Editor's Choice Working over Time: Dynamic Inconsistency in Real Effort Tasks," The Quarterly Journal of Economics, President and Fellows of Harvard College, vol. 130(3), pages 1067-1115.
    8. Michael Daly & Liam Delaney & Colm P. Harmon, 2009. "Psychological and Biological Foundations of Time Preference," Journal of the European Economic Association, MIT Press, vol. 7(2-3), pages 659-669, 04-05.
    9. Anke Becker & Thomas Deckers & Thomas Dohmen & Armin Falk & Fabian Kosse, 2012. "The Relationship Between Economic Preferences and Psychological Personality Measures," Annual Review of Economics, Annual Reviews, vol. 4(1), pages 453-478, July.
    10. Wang, Mei & Rieger, Marc Oliver & Hens, Thorsten, 2016. "How time preferences differ: Evidence from 53 countries," Journal of Economic Psychology, Elsevier, vol. 52(C), pages 115-135.
    11. Cawley, John, 2015. "An economy of scales: A selective review of obesity's economic causes, consequences, and solutions," Journal of Health Economics, Elsevier, vol. 43(C), pages 244-268.
    12. Charles A. Holt & Susan K. Laury, 2002. "Risk Aversion and Incentive Effects," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 92(5), pages 1644-1655, December.
    13. Stephen L. Cheung, 2020. "Eliciting utility curvature in time preference," Experimental Economics, Springer;Economic Science Association, vol. 23(2), pages 493-525, June.
    14. Rieger, Matthias, 2015. "Risk aversion, time preference and health production: Theory and empirical evidence from Cambodia," Economics & Human Biology, Elsevier, vol. 17(C), pages 1-15.
    15. Cawley, John & Ruhm, Christopher J., 2011. "The Economics of Risky Health Behaviors," Handbook of Health Economics, in: Mark V. Pauly & Thomas G. Mcguire & Pedro P. Barros (ed.), Handbook of Health Economics, volume 2, chapter 0, pages 95-199, Elsevier.
    16. Richards, Timothy J. & Hamilton, Stephen F., 2012. "Obesity and Hyperbolic Discounting: An Experimental Analysis," Journal of Agricultural and Resource Economics, Western Agricultural Economics Association, vol. 37(2), pages 1-18, August.
    17. Steffen Andersen & Glenn W. Harrison & Morten I. Lau & E. Elisabet Rutström, 2013. "Discounting Behaviour and the Magnitude Effect: Evidence from a Field Experiment in Denmark," Economica, London School of Economics and Political Science, vol. 80(320), pages 670-697, October.
    18. Almlund, Mathilde & Duckworth, Angela Lee & Heckman, James & Kautz, Tim, 2011. "Personality Psychology and Economics," Handbook of the Economics of Education, in: Erik Hanushek & Stephen Machin & Ludger Woessmann (ed.), Handbook of the Economics of Education, edition 1, volume 4, chapter 0, pages 1-181, Elsevier.
    19. Charles Courtemanche & Garth Heutel & Patrick McAlvanah, 2015. "Impatience, Incentives and Obesity," Economic Journal, Royal Economic Society, vol. 125(582), pages 1-31, February.
    20. Conell-Price, Lynn & Jamison, Julian, 2015. "Predicting health behaviors with economic preferences & locus of control," Journal of Behavioral and Experimental Economics (formerly The Journal of Socio-Economics), Elsevier, vol. 54(C), pages 1-9.
    21. de Oliveira, Angela C.M. & Leonard, Tammy C.M. & Shuval, Kerem & Skinner, Celette Sugg & Eckel, Catherine & Murdoch, James C., 2016. "Economic preferences and obesity among a low-income African American community," Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, Elsevier, vol. 131(PB), pages 196-208.
    22. Tibor Besedeš & Cary Deck & Sudipta Sarangi & Mikhael Shor, 2012. "Age Effects and Heuristics in Decision Making," The Review of Economics and Statistics, MIT Press, vol. 94(2), pages 580-595, May.
    23. George Loewenstein & Drazen Prelec, 1992. "Anomalies in Intertemporal Choice: Evidence and an Interpretation," The Quarterly Journal of Economics, President and Fellows of Harvard College, vol. 107(2), pages 573-597.
    24. Ikeda, Shinsuke & Kang, Myong-Il & Ohtake, Fumio, 2010. "Hyperbolic discounting, the sign effect, and the body mass index," Journal of Health Economics, Elsevier, vol. 29(2), pages 268-284, March.
    25. Stoklosa, Michal & Shuval, Kerem & Drope, Jeffrey & Tchernis, Rusty & Pachucki, Mark & Yaroch, Amy & Harding, Matthew, 2018. "The intergenerational transmission of obesity: The role of time preferences and self-control," Economics & Human Biology, Elsevier, vol. 28(C), pages 92-106.
    26. Armin Falk & Anke Becker & Thomas Dohmen & Benjamin Enke & David B. Huffman & Uwe Sunde, 2017. "Global Evidence on Economic Preferences," NBER Working Papers 23943, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    27. Armin Falk & Anke Becker & Thomas Dohmen & Benjamin Enke & David Huffman & Uwe Sunde, 2018. "Global Evidence on Economic Preferences," The Quarterly Journal of Economics, President and Fellows of Harvard College, vol. 133(4), pages 1645-1692.
    28. Mark V. Pauly & Thomas G. Mcguire & Pedro P. Barros (ed.), 2011. "Handbook of Health Economics," Handbook of Health Economics, Elsevier, volume 2, number 2.
    29. Dodd, Mark C., 2014. "Intertemporal discounting as a risk factor for high BMI: Evidence from Australia, 2008," Economics & Human Biology, Elsevier, vol. 12(C), pages 83-97.
    30. David Laibson, 1997. "Golden Eggs and Hyperbolic Discounting," The Quarterly Journal of Economics, President and Fellows of Harvard College, vol. 112(2), pages 443-478.
    31. Cawley, John & Meyerhoefer, Chad, 2012. "The medical care costs of obesity: An instrumental variables approach," Journal of Health Economics, Elsevier, vol. 31(1), pages 219-230.
    32. Galizzi Matteo M. & Miraldo Marisa, 2017. "Are You What You Eat? Healthy Behaviour and Risk Preferences," The B.E. Journal of Economic Analysis & Policy, De Gruyter, vol. 17(1), pages 1-25, February.
    33. R. H. Strotz, 1955. "Myopia and Inconsistency in Dynamic Utility Maximization," The Review of Economic Studies, Review of Economic Studies Ltd, vol. 23(3), pages 165-180.
    34. Steffen Andersen & Glenn W. Harrison & Morten I. Lau & E. Elisabet Rutström, 2008. "Eliciting Risk and Time Preferences," Econometrica, Econometric Society, vol. 76(3), pages 583-618, May.
    35. Christopher Chabris & David Laibson & Carrie Morris & Jonathon Schuldt & Dmitry Taubinsky, 2008. "Individual laboratory-measured discount rates predict field behavior," Journal of Risk and Uncertainty, Springer, vol. 37(2), pages 237-269, December.
    36. John D. Hey & Chris Orme, 2018. "Investigating Generalizations Of Expected Utility Theory Using Experimental Data," World Scientific Book Chapters, in: Experiments in Economics Decision Making and Markets, chapter 3, pages 63-98, World Scientific Publishing Co. Pte. Ltd..
    37. Galizzi Matteo M. & Miraldo Marisa, 2017. "Are You What You Eat? Healthy Behaviour and Risk Preferences," The B.E. Journal of Economic Analysis & Policy, De Gruyter, vol. 17(1), pages 1-25, January.
    38. Robert Scharff, 2009. "Obesity and Hyperbolic Discounting: Evidence and Implications," Journal of Consumer Policy, Springer, vol. 32(1), pages 3-21, March.
    39. Anderson, Lisa R. & Mellor, Jennifer M., 2008. "Predicting health behaviors with an experimental measure of risk preference," Journal of Health Economics, Elsevier, vol. 27(5), pages 1260-1274, September.
    40. Smith, Patricia K. & Bogin, Barry & Bishai, David, 2005. "Are time preference and body mass index associated?: Evidence from the National Longitudinal Survey of Youth," Economics & Human Biology, Elsevier, vol. 3(2), pages 259-270, July.
    41. Andreoni, James & Kuhn, Michael A. & Sprenger, Charles, 2015. "Measuring time preferences: A comparison of experimental methods," Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, Elsevier, vol. 116(C), pages 451-464.
    42. Shane Frederick & George Loewenstein & Ted O'Donoghue, 2002. "Time Discounting and Time Preference: A Critical Review," Journal of Economic Literature, American Economic Association, vol. 40(2), pages 351-401, June.
    43. Erik Hanushek & Stephen Machin & Ludger Woessmann (ed.), 2011. "Handbook of the Economics of Education," Handbook of the Economics of Education, Elsevier, edition 1, volume 3, number 3, June.
    44. Paul A. Samuelson, 1937. "A Note on Measurement of Utility," The Review of Economic Studies, Review of Economic Studies Ltd, vol. 4(2), pages 155-161.
    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. Cobb-Clark, Deborah A. & Dahmann, Sarah C. & Kamhöfer, Daniel A. & Schildberg-Hörisch, Hannah, 2023. "Self-control and unhealthy body weight: The role of impulsivity and restraint," Economics & Human Biology, Elsevier, vol. 50(C).

    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. Chiara Pastore & Stefanie Schurer & Agnieszka Tymula & Nicholas Fuller & Ian Caterson, 2023. "Economic preferences and obesity: Evidence from a clinical lab‐in‐field study," Health Economics, John Wiley & Sons, Ltd., vol. 32(9), pages 2147-2167, September.
    2. Preuss, Malte, 2021. "Intra-individual stability of two survey measures on forward-looking attitude," Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, Elsevier, vol. 190(C), pages 201-227.
    3. Dániel Horn & Hubert János Kiss, 2020. "Time preferences and their life outcome correlates: Evidence from a representative survey," PLOS ONE, Public Library of Science, vol. 15(7), pages 1-26, July.
    4. Galizzi, Matteo M. & Miraldo, Marisa & Stavropoulou, Charitini & van der Pol, Marjon, 2016. "Doctor–patient differences in risk and time preferences: A field experiment," Journal of Health Economics, Elsevier, vol. 50(C), pages 171-182.
    5. Jindrich Matousek & Tomas Havranek & Zuzana Irsova, 2022. "Individual discount rates: a meta-analysis of experimental evidence," Experimental Economics, Springer;Economic Science Association, vol. 25(1), pages 318-358, February.
    6. James J. Heckman & Tomáš Jagelka & Timothy D. Kautz, 2019. "Some Contributions of Economics to the Study of Personality," NBER Working Papers 26459, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    7. W. David Bradford & Paul Dolan & Matteo M. Galizzi, 2019. "Looking ahead: Subjective time perception and individual discounting," Journal of Risk and Uncertainty, Springer, vol. 58(1), pages 43-69, February.
    8. Joshua Tasoff & Wenjie Zhang, 2022. "The Performance of Time-Preference and Risk-Preference Measures in Surveys," Management Science, INFORMS, vol. 68(2), pages 1149-1173, February.
    9. Akin, Zafer & Yavas, Abdullah, 2023. "Elicited Time Preferences and Behavior in Long-Run Projects," MPRA Paper 117133, University Library of Munich, Germany.
    10. Archana Dang, 2023. "Time preferences and obesity: Evidence from urban India," Agricultural Economics, International Association of Agricultural Economists, vol. 54(4), pages 487-514, July.
    11. Kaywana Raeburn & Jim Engle-Warnick & Sonia Laszlo, 2016. "Determinants of Food Consumption Choices: Experimental Evidence from St. Kitts," CIRANO Working Papers 2016s-43, CIRANO.
    12. Pablo Brañas-Garza & Diego Jorrat & Antonio M. Espín & Angel Sánchez, 2023. "Paid and hypothetical time preferences are the same: lab, field and online evidence," Experimental Economics, Springer;Economic Science Association, vol. 26(2), pages 412-434, April.
    13. Tim Friehe & Markus Pannenberg, 2020. "Time preferences and political regimes: evidence from reunified Germany," Journal of Population Economics, Springer;European Society for Population Economics, vol. 33(1), pages 349-387, January.
    14. Stephen L. Cheung, 2020. "Eliciting utility curvature in time preference," Experimental Economics, Springer;Economic Science Association, vol. 23(2), pages 493-525, June.
    15. Herberholz, Chantal, 2020. "Risk attitude, time preference and health behaviours in the Bangkok Metropolitan Area," Journal of Behavioral and Experimental Economics (formerly The Journal of Socio-Economics), Elsevier, vol. 87(C).
    16. David Bradford & Charles Courtemanche & Garth Heutel & Patrick McAlvanah & Christopher Ruhm, 2017. "Time preferences and consumer behavior," Journal of Risk and Uncertainty, Springer, vol. 55(2), pages 119-145, December.
    17. Cheung, Stephen L. & Tymula, Agnieszka & Wang, Xueting, 2021. "Quasi-Hyperbolic Present Bias: A Meta-Analysis," IZA Discussion Papers 14625, Institute of Labor Economics (IZA).
    18. Aida Isabel Tavares, 2022. "Time and risk preferences among the European seniors, relationship and associated factors," Journal of Business Economics, Springer, vol. 92(8), pages 1283-1302, October.
    19. Stoklosa, Michal & Shuval, Kerem & Drope, Jeffrey & Tchernis, Rusty & Pachucki, Mark & Yaroch, Amy & Harding, Matthew, 2018. "The intergenerational transmission of obesity: The role of time preferences and self-control," Economics & Human Biology, Elsevier, vol. 28(C), pages 92-106.
    20. Stephen L. Cheung & Agnieszka Tymula & Xueting Wang, 2022. "Present bias for monetary and dietary rewards," Experimental Economics, Springer;Economic Science Association, vol. 25(4), pages 1202-1233, September.

    More about this item

    Keywords

    impatience; risk tolerance; obesity; incentive-compatible economic experiment; lab-in-field experiment;
    All these keywords.

    JEL classification:

    • C9 - Mathematical and Quantitative Methods - - Design of Experiments
    • D9 - Microeconomics - - Micro-Based Behavioral Economics
    • D81 - Microeconomics - - Information, Knowledge, and Uncertainty - - - Criteria for Decision-Making under Risk and Uncertainty
    • I12 - Health, Education, and Welfare - - Health - - - Health Behavior

    NEP fields

    This paper has been announced in the following NEP Reports:

    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:iza:izadps:dp13915. 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: Holger Hinte (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://edirc.repec.org/data/izaaade.html .

    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.