Cultured meat experiment: Application to Foie Gras

Last registered on January 04, 2021

Pre-Trial

Trial Information

General Information

Title
Cultured meat experiment: Application to Foie Gras
RCT ID
AEARCTR-0006476
Initial registration date
September 23, 2020

Initial registration date is when the trial was registered.

It corresponds to when the registration was submitted to the Registry to be reviewed for publication.

First published
September 23, 2020, 9:39 AM EDT

First published corresponds to when the trial was first made public on the Registry after being reviewed.

Last updated
January 04, 2021, 9:05 AM EST

Last updated is the most recent time when changes to the trial's registration were published.

Locations

Region

Primary Investigator

Affiliation
CNRS - Université Rennes 1

Other Primary Investigator(s)

PI Affiliation
INRAE - TSE

Additional Trial Information

Status
Completed
Start date
2020-09-28
End date
2020-12-31
Secondary IDs
Abstract
In this experiment, we develop a non-deceptive methodology to estimate the willingness-to-pay for products whose technology is already functional, but that are not on the market yet.
We apply this methodology for a specific category of cultured meat, i.e., foie gras.
We elicit French participants' willingness-to-pay for this new product and correlate it with standard demographic variables and attitudes towards meat.
We further elicit participants' beliefs about the probability that they actually receive the cultured-meat product. We derive the appropriate correction of beliefs when participants report their beliefs under uncertainty about the availability of the product.
External Link(s)

Registration Citation

Citation
Espinosa, Romain and Nicolas Treich. 2021. "Cultured meat experiment: Application to Foie Gras." AEA RCT Registry. January 04. https://doi.org/10.1257/rct.6476-1.1
Sponsors & Partners

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Experimental Details

Interventions

Intervention(s)
Participants are first exposed to a pre-experimental questionnaire at least one week before the actual experiment. We elicit: their diet, their pro-meat justification, their concerns about dietary choices, neophobia.

Later, participants do the experiment. In the experiment, they are introduced with a cultured meat product (Foie Gras) developed by a French start-up. This product is not on the market yet, and cannot be delivered to participants.

Participants are told that it has been determined prior to the experiment whether they will actually receive the product depending on availability. Participants receive the money that they can use to buy the product (if available). We further elicit: their perception of the product, their perception of farmed foie gras, their pro-meat justification, their beliefs about the availability of the product (using quadratic scoring rule), their risk aversion, and some demographics (age, gender, countryside-raised, political self-placement).
Intervention Start Date
2020-09-28
Intervention End Date
2020-12-31

Primary Outcomes

Primary Outcomes (end points)
Willingness-to-pay (WTP) for the cultured meat product.
The beliefs about the availability of the product.
Primary Outcomes (explanation)
The elicitation of the WTP is made using a Becker–DeGroot–Marschak method (BDM) with a list of prices from 0€ up to 8€ for 100g of cultured meat. The WTP is either equal zero if the respondent reports "I don't buy" for all prices. It lies in the interval between the two prices that define the switching point if there is one switching point. It is above 8€ if the respondent reports "I buy" for all list of prices.
We will keep only well-behaved answers (i.e., monotonic decrease in utility with the price).

The beliefs about the availability of the product will be incentivized with a quadratic scoring rule. We will primarily examine if the probability that the product is delivered is strictly greater than zero, and consider appropriate correction for stakes and risk aversion.

Secondary Outcomes

Secondary Outcomes (end points)
Pro-meat justifications (PMJ), Animal-based consumption (ABC), Neophobia, risk aversion.
Secondary Outcomes (explanation)
PMJ: sum of items.
ABC: Principal component analysis on red meat, white meat, fish, eggs, diary products.
Neophobia: score defined by Pliner 1992, Appetite.
Risk aversion: See Holt and Laury (AER, 2002).

Experimental Design

Experimental Design
Participants will fulfill the pre-experimental questionnaire (see materials) and then the experiment at least one week after (see materials).
Experimental Design Details
Randomization Method
Computer determines the price in the BDM.
Randomization Unit
Individual.
Was the treatment clustered?
No

Experiment Characteristics

Sample size: planned number of clusters
About 300 participants (depending on attendance to the sessions). 10 sessions planed with 30 to 40 participants per session.
Sample size: planned number of observations
About 300 participants (depending on attendance to the sessions). 10 sessions planed with 30 to 40 participants per session.
Sample size (or number of clusters) by treatment arms
About 300 participants (depending on attendance to the sessions). 10 sessions planed with 30 to 40 participants per session.
Minimum detectable effect size for main outcomes (accounting for sample design and clustering)
Supporting Documents and Materials

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IRB

Institutional Review Boards (IRBs)

IRB Name
Managers of the Laboratory for Experiments in Economic & Management, University of Rennes 1
IRB Approval Date
2020-09-23
IRB Approval Number
N/A (See materials for the IRBN Approval)

Post-Trial

Post Trial Information

Study Withdrawal

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Intervention

Is the intervention completed?
Yes
Intervention Completion Date
October 31, 2020, 12:00 +00:00
Data Collection Complete
Yes
Data Collection Completion Date
October 31, 2020, 12:00 +00:00
Final Sample Size: Number of Clusters (Unit of Randomization)
182
Was attrition correlated with treatment status?
No
Final Sample Size: Total Number of Observations
182
Final Sample Size (or Number of Clusters) by Treatment Arms
182
Data Publication

Data Publication

Is public data available?
No

Program Files

Program Files
Reports, Papers & Other Materials

Relevant Paper(s)

Reports & Other Materials