Behavioral determinants on individual preferences for reducing health risks

Last registered on March 27, 2023
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Pre-Trial

Trial Information

General Information

Title
Behavioral determinants on individual preferences for reducing health risks
RCT ID
AEARCTR-0009455
Initial registration date
May 17, 2022

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
May 18, 2022, 5:13 PM EDT

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

Last updated
March 27, 2023, 10:34 AM EDT

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

Locations

Country
China
Region
Country
France
Region
Country
United States of America
Region

Primary Investigator

Name
Henrik Andersson
Affiliation
Toulouse School of Economics
Contact Primary Investigator

Other Primary Investigator(s)

PI Name
Jiakun Zheng
PI Affiliation
Renmin University, China
Contact Investigator

Additional Trial Information

Status
In development
Start date
2022-06-01
End date
2023-12-31
Keywords
Behavior, Health
Additional Keywords
JEL code(s)
Secondary IDs
Prior work
This trial does not extend or rely on any prior RCTs.
Abstract
The aim of this study is to elicit respondents’ willingness to pay (WTP) to reduce the risks of getting sick or dying from influenza or traffic accidents. The main objective is to derive estimates of the value of a statistical life and value of a statistical illness/injury that can be considered for policy purposes. In addition to this more policy focused objective the project also has two more research focused objectives: (i) to examine to what extent regret aversion may influence WTP for health-risk reduction, and (ii) to what extent loss-aversion, both financial and health, may influence WTP for health-risk reductions. Data will be collected using online stated-preference surveys with different treatments.
External Link(s)

Registration Citation

Citation
Andersson, Henrik and Jiakun Zheng. 2023. "Behavioral determinants on individual preferences for reducing health risks." AEA RCT Registry. March 27. https://doi.org/10.1257/rct.9455-2.0
Sponsors & Partners

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Experimental Details

Interventions

Intervention(s)
Data will be collected in stated-preference survey, i.e. hypothetical choice setting. The surveys will be conducted using web panels in France and China, and on Amazon MTurk on a US sample. Respondents in the US sample will be recruited through MTurk (https://www.mturk.com/). Professional survey companies with access to web panels will be used for France and China, and hence respondent in the French and Chinse samples will be recruited from those panels used (not yet decided).
Intervention Start Date
2022-06-15
Intervention End Date
2023-12-31

Primary Outcomes

Primary Outcomes (end points)
Willingness to pay (WTP) and willingness to accept (WTA) for health-risk changes.
Primary Outcomes (explanation)
The objective of the project is to examine whether individuals’ willingness to pay (WTP) and willingness to accept (WTA) for changes in health risks are influenced by their regret and/or loss aversion. Hence, the main endpoints of interest are the respondents' answers regarding their WTP or WTA for different health-risk reductions, and how they relate to their answers about regret and loss aversion.

Secondary Outcomes

Secondary Outcomes (end points)
Regret and loss aversion.
Secondary Outcomes (explanation)
The survey covers both influenza and traffic risks and it is of interest to examine if the respondents WTP and WTA, and how they are related to regret and loss aversion, may depend on risk type.

Experimental Design

Experimental Design
The surveys uses the stated-preference format, hence choice scenarios are hypothetical. After some "warm-up" questions related to self-perceived health status and experiences, and information about the health risks in the survey, respondents face hypothetical valuation questions using the contingent valuation format. That is, the valuation questions are framed as yes/no questions whether the respondents are willing to pay (WTAP, accept, WTA) to access (forgo) the risk reduction. Each respondents will face 4 different type of questions; one about mortality and one about morbidity risk, and one framed as WTP and one as WTA.

To examine whether respondents’ loss aversion related to financial decisions depends on whether lottery decisions are hypothetical or not, the sample will be split into one subsample facing hypothetical lotteries and one subsample making decisions which can influence their final payment. Ten percent of respondents will be randomly allocated to the incentivized sample and will be inform that one of their choices in the financial lottery will be implemented (see the survey in the appendix for the wording of this question). As a reminder, all questions related to health choices are hypothetical.

In addition to whether respondents are randomly allocated to the incentivized treatment, they will also randomly be allocated to either a treatment asked about influenza or traffic risk. There will also a randomization of the order of the valuation questions.
Experimental Design Details
Randomization Method
Randomization will be done by survey companies for the French and Chinese samples, and by LimeSurvey on the MTurk sample.
Randomization Unit
Individual
Was the treatment clustered?
No

Experiment Characteristics

Sample size: planned number of clusters
None
Sample size: planned number of observations
2000 in each country.
Sample size (or number of clusters) by treatment arms
Each country sample will consist of 8 treatments with ca. 250 respondents. The sample will be split into questions about influenza or traffic, and each of those into 4 different treatments based on order of questions.
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
The TSE Research Ethics Committee for Experimental Research
IRB Approval Date
2022-05-05
IRB Approval Number
N/A
Analysis Plan

Post-Trial

Post Trial Information

Study Withdrawal

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Intervention

Is the intervention completed?
No
Data Collection Complete
Data Publication

Data Publication

Is public data available?
No

Program Files

Program Files
Reports, Papers & Other Materials

Relevant Paper(s)

Reports & Other Materials