TY - JOUR
T1 - Simple Stated Preference Questions Can Enhance Transdisciplinary Projects
T2 - Linking Perceived Risks With Willingness to Spray and Pay
AU - Enriquez, Aaron J.
AU - Berry, Kevin
AU - del Pilar Fernandez, Maria
AU - Gregory, Nichar
AU - Ernst, Kacey C.
AU - Hayden, Mary H.
AU - Diuk-Wasser, Maria
N1 - Publisher Copyright:
© Kevin Berry, Maria del Pilar Fernandez, Nichar Gregory, Kacey Ernst, Mary Hayden, Maria Diuk-Wasser. Parts of this work were authored by US Federal Government authors and are not under copyright protection in the US; foreign copyright protection may apply 2024.
PY - 2025/1
Y1 - 2025/1
N2 - Transdisciplinary projects can uncover crucial insights on people’s past and future risk-mitigation behavior. We focus on a novel risk context: increasing health threats from ticks on Staten Island, a New York City borough where the combination of high population density and extensive park systems and green spaces has resulted in a rise in locally-acquired tick-transmitted disease cases. We administered a knowledge, attitudes, and practices survey that additionally included simple economic stated preference questions about people’s willingness to spray tick pesticides in the future. We first analyze factors that are correlated with people’s perceptions of two types of risks: exposure to ticks and infection with Lyme disease. Next, we use the nonmarket valuation questions to test people’s willingness to spray and pay as a function of attributes of the hypothetical pesticides, including cost, effectiveness, and type. Across all model specifications, overall willingness to pay (WTP) to spray increases with increases in pesticide effectiveness, as well as with favorable pesticide type (organic). We uncover threshold pesticide effectiveness levels at which WTP to spray turns positive, and we find that lower pesticide effectiveness is required for organic pesticide. Finally, we test how perceived risks and various individual-specific characteristics correlate with WTP to spray. Combinations of higher perceived risks are linked both with higher WTP and lower breakeven pesticide effectiveness. Our work shows that a broad range of variables influence demand for self-protection actions, both directly and indirectly (through their effects on perceived risks). Such insights on people’s tradeoffs carry important policy implications, but they can be missed if economic information is either not elicited or elicited alone.
AB - Transdisciplinary projects can uncover crucial insights on people’s past and future risk-mitigation behavior. We focus on a novel risk context: increasing health threats from ticks on Staten Island, a New York City borough where the combination of high population density and extensive park systems and green spaces has resulted in a rise in locally-acquired tick-transmitted disease cases. We administered a knowledge, attitudes, and practices survey that additionally included simple economic stated preference questions about people’s willingness to spray tick pesticides in the future. We first analyze factors that are correlated with people’s perceptions of two types of risks: exposure to ticks and infection with Lyme disease. Next, we use the nonmarket valuation questions to test people’s willingness to spray and pay as a function of attributes of the hypothetical pesticides, including cost, effectiveness, and type. Across all model specifications, overall willingness to pay (WTP) to spray increases with increases in pesticide effectiveness, as well as with favorable pesticide type (organic). We uncover threshold pesticide effectiveness levels at which WTP to spray turns positive, and we find that lower pesticide effectiveness is required for organic pesticide. Finally, we test how perceived risks and various individual-specific characteristics correlate with WTP to spray. Combinations of higher perceived risks are linked both with higher WTP and lower breakeven pesticide effectiveness. Our work shows that a broad range of variables influence demand for self-protection actions, both directly and indirectly (through their effects on perceived risks). Such insights on people’s tradeoffs carry important policy implications, but they can be missed if economic information is either not elicited or elicited alone.
KW - Risk perceptions
KW - Stated preference questions
KW - Tick pesticide
KW - Tick-transmitted diseases
KW - Willingness to pay
UR - http://www.scopus.com/inward/record.url?scp=85208920031&partnerID=8YFLogxK
UR - http://www.scopus.com/inward/citedby.url?scp=85208920031&partnerID=8YFLogxK
U2 - 10.1007/s10640-024-00923-5
DO - 10.1007/s10640-024-00923-5
M3 - Article
AN - SCOPUS:85208920031
SN - 0924-6460
VL - 88
SP - 81
EP - 124
JO - Environmental and Resource Economics
JF - Environmental and Resource Economics
IS - 1
ER -