How viewing a forest affects willingness to pay of users and non-users in Contingent Valuation Method?

Abstract

In Contingent Valuation studies, users generally declare willingness to pay (WTP) higher than non-users. This study attempts to investigate if viewing the good during CV survey has different impact on users and non-users WTPs. A framed field experiment was conducted in which users and non-users were surveyed in two locations - one with a view of the forest and the other without it. Our study showed that the WTPs of users were significantly higher than those of non-users only when respondensts did not see forest during the survey. However, when the experiment was conducted in a location where the respondents could see the forest - the difference disappeared. Our results also show that the relationship between declared WTP and both the respondents’ socio-demographic status and their environmental attitudes were weaker among respondents surveyed in a location with a forest view. We believe that the increase in WTP of non-users is temporary and represents a kind of bias. This in turn may be relevant in the design of CVM studies.