Smokers, Smoking Deprivation, and Time Discounting

Abstract

Standard-Nutzungsbedingungen:Die Dokumente auf EconStor dürfen zu eigenen wissenschaftlichen Zwecken und zum Privatgebrauch gespeichert und kopiert werden.Sie dürfen die Dokumente nicht für öffentliche oder kommerzielle Zwecke vervielfältigen, öffentlich ausstellen, öffentlich zugänglich machen, vertreiben oder anderweitig nutzen.Sofern die Verfasser die Dokumente unter Open-Content-Lizenzen (insbesondere CC-Lizenzen) zur Verfügung gestellt haben sollten, gelten abweichend von diesen Nutzungsbedingungen die in der dort genannten Lizenz gewährten Nutzungsrechte. Terms of use: Documents in AbstractThis paper investigates whether smokers exhibit greater time discounting than non-smokers, and how short-term nicotine deprivation affects time discounting. A unique feature of our experiment is that our subjects receive rewards not only of money, but also of actual tobacco. This is done in order to elicit smokers' true preferences.Smokers are more impatient than non-smokers, consistent with previous studies.Additionally, nicotine deprivation makes smokers even more impatient. These results suggest that nicotine concentration has different effects on time preferences in the short and long runs. JEL Classifications: D03, D90, I10, Q57

The onset time delaying effect: smokers vs non-smokers place the adverse consequences of smoking further in the future

“…Based on previous findings on smokers' impatience for rewards (Ert, Yechiam, & Arshavsky, 2013;Yamane et al, 2013), we hypothesized a reverse effect where the negative consequences of smoking are concerned. Specifically, we expected that smokers should delay the onset time of SRCs compared to non-smokers.…”

“…Our study further specifies past research that shows that time perception can be distorted in smokers. Not only smokers devalue delayed rewards (Bickel et al, 1999;Reynolds et al, 2004;Yamane et al, 2013), they are less future orientated (Keough et al, 1999), and they perceive the costs from smoking as more temporally remote than its benefits (Hall & Fong, 2007), but smokers, compared to non-smokers, also postpone the onset of the health-damaging consequences of smoking. Future studies should investigate whether this result could be replicated when participants are asked to refer to themselves and also to smokers with different smoking histories.…”