Driven by utility or regret? Investigating the influence of decision-rule heterogeneity on public preferences for desertification control policies

Abstract

In the matter of investigating public preferences and stated value for desertification control policies, the choice experiment (CE) could provide valuable insights. However, traditional CE studies modeled the data based on the random utility maximization (RUM) framework, which ignores the significant impact of decision rules on individual choice behavior, such as the random regret minimization (RRM). To examine the influence of decision-rule heterogeneity on public preferences for desertification control scenarios, this study introduced a generalized random regret minimization (G-RRM) model to analyze public choices and developed a hybrid latent class model incorporating the RUM, RRM, and G-RRM choice paradigms to clarify the formation mechanism of decision-rule heterogeneity. The findings indicate that all RRM models demonstrate a better fit with the data than the RUM model, and 68.77% of respondents express significant preference for the RRM choice paradigm. Regret can serve as an important driving factor in public choices for desertification control policies. The hybrid latent class model containing the G-RRM class with different attribute-specific values achieves the best fit, revealing that decision-rule heterogeneity significantly influences individuals' choice behavior, and such heterogeneity is not only among different respondents, but also in their trade-offs across various attributes. The results also reveal the relationship between respondents’ heterogeneous preferences for choice paradigms and their personality traits. Specifically, respondents with less education, residence years, and perceived usefulness of desertification control tend to prefer the RUM choice paradigm; female and respondents with more income, attention, and perceived usefulness of desertification control tend to prefer the RRM choice paradigm; as well as respondents with higher satisfaction to the current desertification situation show a greater decision-rule heterogeneity across different attributes. These results may provide interesting policy consequences, as they offer a precise comprehension of public choices for desertification control policies, through a combination of diverse decision rules.