Measuring Natural Resource Damages with Contingent Valuation: Tests of Validity and Reliability

Scope insensitivity in helping decisions: Is it a matter of culture and values?

“…However, research in the last decade consistently shows that people are insensitive to the magnitude of quantitative outcomes in their willingness to support public causes and in moral decisions (e.g., Baron, 1997;Desvousges et al 1993;Frederick & Fischhoff, 1998;Kahneman & Ritov, 1994). Particularly, Hsee & Rottenstreich's (2004) research supports the idea that subjective values are highly sensitive to the presence or absence of a stimulus (i.e., a change from 0 to some number) but are giving and volunteering in individualistic states (as compared with more collectivist states) in the United States, especially when the causes were compatible with individualistic causes.…”

Scale sensitivity and question order in the contingent valuation method

“…In addition to the criticism of hypothetical bias (List and Gallet 2001;Murphy et al 2005), much of the criticism has been based on the lack of scale sensitivity found in many CVM studies. 1 This has particularly been found in studies on "non-use values", where respondents have been found to be willing to pay the same amount to save different number of wild species or to protect different amounts of other environmental resources (Kahneman and Knetsch 1992;Desvouges et al 1993). Whereas the advocates of CVM argue that the lack of scale sensitivity is a result of bad survey design (Smith 1992;Carson and Mitchell 1995;Carson et al 2001), its critics argue that the CVM is not capable of eliciting individual preferences (Desvouges, Johnson et al 1993;Diamond and Hausman 1994;Kahneman et al 1999).…”

“…1 This has particularly been found in studies on "non-use values", where respondents have been found to be willing to pay the same amount to save different number of wild species or to protect different amounts of other environmental resources (Kahneman and Knetsch 1992;Desvouges et al 1993). Whereas the advocates of CVM argue that the lack of scale sensitivity is a result of bad survey design (Smith 1992;Carson and Mitchell 1995;Carson et al 2001), its critics argue that the CVM is not capable of eliciting individual preferences (Desvouges, Johnson et al 1993;Diamond and Hausman 1994;Kahneman et al 1999). Recent research suggests, however, that a general dismissal of the CVM on the basis of scale insensitivity is unwarranted, and that scale insensitivity can be in line with economic theory, and to be expected also in well conducted studies (Heberlein et al 2005).…”

Measuring the Willingness to Pay for Improved Air Quality: A Contingent Valuation Survey

“…However, a precise indication of the level of reduction in air pollution might not be a significant problem in terms of comparability due to the fact that people experience difficulty in distinguishing between differences in quantity and the scale of provision of a good, which has been suggested by a study of Desvousges et al (1993) [61]. What people value is a significant reduction in air pollution despite the reduction being precisely quantified as 25% or 50%.…”