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‘When to take “no” for an answer’? Using entreaties to reduce protests in contingent valuation studies

Atkinson, Giles ORCID: 0000-0001-6736-3074, Morse-Jones, Sian, Mourato, Susana ORCID: 0000-0002-9361-9990 and Provins, Allan (2012) ‘When to take “no” for an answer’? Using entreaties to reduce protests in contingent valuation studies. Environmental and Resource Economics, 51 (4). pp. 497-523. ISSN 0924-6460

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Identification Number: 10.1007/s10640-011-9509-3

Abstract

We report the results of two field experiments to investigate the usefulness of entreaties in reducing protest zero responses in contingent valuation (CV) studies. These two experiments estimate willingness to pay for tropical biodiversity amongst distant beneficiaries and for reductions in water supply risks, respectively. The entreaties in both contexts, in essence, entailed an additional text to 'talk people out of their protests' using, respectively, a split sample test and a within sample test. Results indicate that, in both cases, these scripts were effective in significantly reducing protest zeros, with one experiment reducing protests at the payment principle stage of the valuation scenario and the other reducing protests at the payment elicitation stage. Using entreaties in this way tentatively may be a useful contribution to the existing CV literature where protests rates are high and, moreover, appear to 'defy' efforts to address the issue through best practice in the design and testing of survey instruments. However, while protests were reduced by about a third in both cases, the entreaties clearly did not eliminate a majority of protest zeros. Moreover, as we discuss, there are good reasons why the responses of 'reclaimed' protestors remain open to scrutiny.

Item Type: Article
Official URL: http://www.springerlink.com/content/100263/
Additional Information: © 2011 Springer
Divisions: Geography & Environment
Subjects: G Geography. Anthropology. Recreation > GE Environmental Sciences
H Social Sciences > H Social Sciences (General)
J Political Science > JA Political science (General)
Date Deposited: 08 Dec 2011 16:33
Last Modified: 14 Mar 2024 23:45
URI: http://eprints.lse.ac.uk/id/eprint/40063

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