Air pollution and perception-based averting behaviour in the Jinchuan mining area, China

Abstract

This paper presents a simultaneous equation, knowledge and perception-based averting behavior model of health risk caused by air pollution, with application to the Jinchuan mining area, China. Three types of averting behavior are distinguished: (a) purchases of purifying equipment, plants, or masks; (b) purchases of preventive or curing medication or food; and (c) adjustment of daily outdoor activities. Two types of perceived health risk are distinguished: (a) risk due to the intensity of exposure and (b) risk caused by the hazardousness of pollutants. The estimations show that an increase in perceived air pollution of two or more days a week leads to a restriction of outdoor activities of approximately 90 min per person per week. Another result is that the average annual household expenditure on air filters, foods, or medicines is 206.25 CNY (US$ 31.73) to prevent the hazardousness of air pollution. The total willingness to pay for air quality improvement is 2.95% of annual net household income. Because air quality improving investments can only be implemented in the medium or long run, daily disclosure of air quality is an adequate short-run policy handle to assist residents to take the right kind and level of risk-reducing actions.

Air pollution perception for air quality management: a systematic review exploring research themes and future perspectives

“…The indicators, demography, perception, knowledge (Kramm et al 2022), air quality data (Brody et al 2004, Chiarini et al 2020, media sources (Hong et al 2022), behaviour (Tan and Xu 2019), attitude (Schmitz et al 2018), etc and the methodology used in the past studies are detailed in table 2. Many different statistical methods have been used for data analysis, from basic descriptive statistics (Szopinska et al 2022a) to advanced Structural equation Modelling (Yu et al 2021, Li andFolmer 2022). Linear (Huang et al 2017) and logistic regression (Hong et al 2022) are the most common statistical techniques used in these studies.…”

Influencing factors of air-quality perception in China: What is constructed? What is hidden?

“…The influence of PM 2.5 on the mortality related to urogenital diseases is greater than that of cardiovascular and respiratory diseases, and the influence of NO 2 and black carbon (BC) on the mortality related to cancer is greater than that of respiratory diseases (Ho et al, 2020). Individuals acquit with environmental knowledge would evaluate the air condition and take action like restricting outdoor activities and increasing expenditure for risks (Li and Folmer, 2022). Therefore, both the exposure to polluted air and the hazard of pollutants negatively and significantly influences individuals' happiness (Li et al, 2014).…”