Using multiple choice tasks per respondent in discrete choice experiment studies increases the amount of available information. However, respondents’ learning and fatigue may lead to changes in observed utility function preference (taste) parameters, as well as the variance in its error term...

Governments sometimes try to increase individuals’ contributions to public goods through appeals to consumer responsibility, rather than by economic incentives, for example in recycling campaigns. Using standard consumer theory, one would hardly expect such campaigns to work at all; but if...

Duty-orientation implies a warm glow of giving as well as a cold shiver of not giving enough. If duty-oriented consumers learn their moral responsibility by observing others’ behavior, social interaction in contribution behavior arises. However, since moral responsibility is a burden,...

Stated preference studies tell respondents that policies create environmental changes with varying levels of uncertainty. However, respondents may include their own a priori assessments of uncertainty when making choices among policy options. Using a choice experiment eliciting...

This paper investigates the idea that people are unsure about the value they place on prospective changes in environmental goods. In particular, we focus on a parametric explanation of the determinants of a "value gap," the difference between the most someone is sure they would pay for an...

Policymakers are increasingly making use of benefits transfer in benefit-cost assessments of environmental policy. An important question is how big the resultant errors are, and how sensitive errors are to how the transfer is conducted. We employ a choice experiment focusing on landscape...

This paper is concerned with policies for the supply of public, environmental goods from the farm sector. In particular, we characterize the buying of these goods by the public from farmers using the "Provider Gets Principle." This principle is well established in OECD countries, as we...

Protected areas are employed worldwide as a means of conserving biodiversity. Unfortunately, restricting access to such areas imposes opportunity costs on local people who have traditionally relied on them to obtain resources such as fuelwood and bushmeat. We use contingent valuation to estimate...

This paper considers the use of a "combinatorial optimization" technique in the aggregation of environmental benefit values. Combinatorial optimization is used to statistically match population census data to a contingent valuation survey. The matched survey and census information is then used...

We attempt a first combination of the participatory technique known as the "citizens’ jury" with choice modelling, a stated-preference technique increasingly favored by environmental economists. Our application is conducted in the context of water quality improvements under the Water Framework...