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Respondent uncertainty in contingent valuation: the case of whale conservation in Newfoundland and Labrador

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  • Lyssenko, Nikita
  • Martinez-Espineira, Roberto

Abstract

In this paper we investigate the issue of respondent uncertainty in contingent valuation studies while estimating the willingness to pay for a whale conservation program o¤ the coasts of Newfoundland and Labrador. We use data from a phone survey administered to a sample (N=614) of adult Canadians, proposing a policy consisting of subsidizing and enforcing the use of acoustic devices that would reduce the likelihood that whales become entangled in �shing nets. A follow-up question asked respondents how certain they were about their answer to the main dichotomous-choice question, which allows us to investigate how the treatment of uncertainty a¤ects value measures. A mean willingness to pay of about $81/year per respondent is estimated when accounting for the degree of certainty with which respondents expressed their willingness to pay. We also analyze payment vehicle e¤ects using a split-sample approach whereby some respondents were asked a dichotomous-choice question about a tax contribution while others were asked about a voluntary donation instead.

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  • Lyssenko, Nikita & Martinez-Espineira, Roberto, 2009. "Respondent uncertainty in contingent valuation: the case of whale conservation in Newfoundland and Labrador," MPRA Paper 21969, University Library of Munich, Germany.
  • Handle: RePEc:pra:mprapa:21969
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    Cited by:

    1. Suziana Hassan & Søren Bøye Olsen & Bo Jellesmark Thorsen, 2018. "Appropriate Payment Vehicles in Stated Preference Studies in Developing Economies," Environmental & Resource Economics, Springer;European Association of Environmental and Resource Economists, vol. 71(4), pages 1053-1075, December.
    2. Lyssenko, Nikita & Martinez-Espineira, Roberto, 2009. "`Been there done that': Disentangling option value effects from user heterogeneity when valuing natural resources with a use component," MPRA Paper 21976, University Library of Munich, Germany, revised 08 Apr 2010.
    3. Voltaire, Louinord & Pirrone, Claudio & Bailly, Denis, 2013. "Dealing with preference uncertainty in contingent willingness to pay for a nature protection program: A new approach," Ecological Economics, Elsevier, vol. 88(C), pages 76-85.
    4. Pierre-Alexandre Mahieu & François-Charles Wolff & Jason Shogren & Pascal Gastineau, 2017. "Interval bidding in a distribution elicitation format," Applied Economics, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 49(51), pages 5200-5211, November.
    5. Martínez-Espiñeira, Roberto & Lyssenko, Nikita, 2011. "Correcting for the endogeneity of pro-environment behavioral choices in contingent valuation," Ecological Economics, Elsevier, vol. 70(8), pages 1435-1439, June.
    6. Kreg Lindberg & Christopher Wolsko, 2019. "Assessing Well-Being Factors in a Growing Community: A Multi-Attribute Vignette Approach," Social Indicators Research: An International and Interdisciplinary Journal for Quality-of-Life Measurement, Springer, vol. 144(1), pages 315-335, July.
    7. Schwoerer, Tobias & Knowler, Duncan & Garcia-Martinez, Salvador, 2016. "The value of whale watching to local communities in Baja, Mexico: A case study using applied economic rent theory," Ecological Economics, Elsevier, vol. 127(C), pages 90-101.
    8. Stephen O'Neill & Lava Prakash Yadav, 2016. "Willingness to pay towards a public good: how does a refund option affect stated values?," Journal of Environmental Planning and Management, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 59(2), pages 342-359, February.
    9. Persichina, Marco & Kriström, Bengt, 2022. "Self-selected intervals in psycho-physic experiments and the measurement of willingness to pay," Journal of Behavioral and Experimental Economics (formerly The Journal of Socio-Economics), Elsevier, vol. 98(C).

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    More about this item

    Keywords

    contingent valuation; whales; preference uncertainty; dichotomous choice; payment vehicle; willingness to pay;
    All these keywords.

    JEL classification:

    • Q5 - Agricultural and Natural Resource Economics; Environmental and Ecological Economics - - Environmental Economics
    • Q51 - Agricultural and Natural Resource Economics; Environmental and Ecological Economics - - Environmental Economics - - - Valuation of Environmental Effects

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