Socio-Economics, Macaulay Institute, Craigiebuckler, AB158QH Aberdeen, UK.
J Environ Manage. 2011 Mar;92(3):531-41. doi: 10.1016/j.jenvman.2010.09.003. Epub 2010 Oct 8.
This paper describes an approach to account for asymmetric preference formation in discrete choice models used for environmental valuation. The paper draws on data from a case study on preferences for environmental change resulting from a hypothetical rural development and conservation programme in Indonesia. Local knowledge on the current state of the environment was used to define an individual-specific status quo that consistently frames changes in a range of environmental services as gains or losses matching the perceptions of the local population living in the vicinity of a National Park. I estimated choice models that included separate parameters for increases and decreases in attribute levels for the environmental services and derived the indicators of local willingness to pay (WTP) corresponding to the bidirectional changes relative to the individual-specific status quo option. I found clear evidence of an asymmetric response to increase and decrease in attribute levels relative to the status quo. Ignoring asymmetric preference formation can therefore result in biased estimates of WTP indicators and welfare measures of change in cases where the outcomes of environmental programmes can plausibly result in both an increase and a decrease relative to a reference option. Compared to a symmetrical modelling approach, the combination of simultaneously accounting for asymmetric preference formation and preference heterogeneity in the choice model yielded additional insights that may be used to inform the development of local strategies towards biodiversity conservation.
本文提出了一种在环境评估中用于离散选择模型的方法，以考虑不对称偏好的形成。本文利用印度尼西亚一项关于农村发展和保护计划引起的环境变化偏好的案例研究数据。利用关于当前环境状况的本地知识，定义了一个特定于个体的现状，该现状始终将一系列环境服务的变化框定为与生活在国家公园附近的当地居民的看法相匹配的收益或损失，这些变化与现状相对应。我估计了包括环境服务属性水平增加和减少的单独参数的选择模型，并得出了与相对于特定于个体的现状选项的双向变化相对应的本地支付意愿 (WTP) 指标的指示。我发现，相对于现状，对属性水平的增加和减少的反应存在明显的不对称性。因此，如果环境计划的结果相对于参考选项可能导致增加和减少，那么忽略不对称偏好形成可能会导致 WTP 指标和变化的福利衡量存在偏差。与对称建模方法相比，选择模型中同时考虑不对称偏好形成和偏好异质性的组合提供了更多的见解，这些见解可用于为制定保护生物多样性的本地战略提供信息。
