Social Psychology and Environmental Economics: A New Look at ex ante Corrections of Biased Preference Evaluation

Abstract

Environmental economics is now a long standing field of research; much has been learned on how environmental policy can use incentives to drive individual behaviors. Among the many examples, preference elicitation is the most discussed case in which incentives fail to accurately implement efficient behavior. Using this as our motivating example, herein we explore the cross-fertilization between environmental economics and social psychology . We first review how the lessons drawn from social psychology helped address the hypothetical bias issue. We then turn to the future of this process by focusing on how cheap talk scripts influence preference elicitation. Our experimental results shows CT scripts work through persuasion -i.e. changes mind, but poorly changes actions. In that sense, preference elicitation still lacks a way of making communication binding -i.e. a way to alter intrinsic motivation of subjects to behave truthfully. Keywords:Social psychology, Commitment, Persuasive communication, Preference elicitation JEL Classification: C9; H4; Q5 Résumé L'économie de l'environnement a depuis longtemps permis de mettre en évidence les moyens par lesquels les politiques publiques menées dans ce domaine peuvent s'appuyer sur les incitations pour orienter les comportements. Les méthodes de révélation des préférences restent cependant l'un des exemples les plus étudiés de défaillance des incitations. En s'appuyant sur cette illustration, cet article propose une synthèse des progrès réalisés en économie de l'environnement grâce à l'intégration des résultats issus de la psychologie sociale. La première partie de l'article propose une revue des méthodes issues de cette discipline et destinées à corriger le biais hypothétique. La seconde partie s'appuie sur une expérience en laboratoire pour évaluer la capacité des scripts de cheap talk à résoudre ce problème. Les comportements observés montrent que les scripts de cheap talk influencent les comportements par un effet de persuasion -i.e. agissent sur les intentions, mais n'affectent que faiblement les actions. En ce sens, les méthodes de révélation des préférences souffrent toujours du manque d'une méthode de communication engageante -i.e. permettant d'affecter la motivation intrinsèque des individus à révéler leurs préférences vraies.

Preference elicitation under oath

“…The design of this experiment follows Jacquemet, James, Luchini, and Shogren (2011). Before the HG auctions take place, the instructions conclude with a text highlighting the hypothetical bias generally observed in preference elicitation literature.…”

“…The auction offers a high level of experimental control, but has little practicality in public opinion surveys. In a companion paper, we have extended the oath to elicitation mechanisms more frequently used in practice, such as the referendum (Jacquemet, James, Luchini, and Shogren, 2010). In addition, we drew from a limited pool of subjects, which leaves open the question of sample selection.…”

Testing the effectiveness of the oath script in reducing the hypothetical bias in the Contingent Valuation Method

“…The findings of Jacquemet et al (2011) with a solemn oath are promising. However, given that a solemn oath involves participants who have to make a commitment, there is a possibility that some subjects may not take it seriously due to the religious (e.g.…”

“…Given the non-conclusive results on the effectiveness of the CT in mitigating vhypothetical bias, Jacquemet et al (2011Jacquemet et al ( , 2013 proposed the use of another ex-ante non-monetary correction technique taken from the social psychology and called the "solemn oath". They argued that the solemn oath can be used as a truthtelling commitment device, by asking the bidders to swear on their honor to give honest answers prior to participating in a non-hypothetical experimental setting (i.e.…”

“…Furthermore, since the participants' cultural and religious background is likely to change from one sample to another, assessing the effectiveness of the oath scripts in different contexts (e.g. various countries with different cultural backgrounds) is necessary to at least check the robustness of Jacquemet et al (2011)'s findings.…”