TY  - GEN
N2  - Can Attribution Science, a method for quantifying ? ex post ? humanity?s contribution to adverse climatic events, induce pro-environmental behavioral change? We conduct a conceptual test of this question by studying, in an online experiment with 3,031 participants, whether backwards-looking attribution affects future decisions, even when seemingly uninformative to a consequentialist decision-maker. By design, adverse events can arise as a result of participants? pursuit of higher payoffs (anthropogenic cause) or as a result of chance (natural cause). Treatments vary whether adverse events are causally attributable and whether attribution can be acquired at cost. We find that ex-post attributability is behaviorally relevant: Attribution to an anthropogenic cause reduces future anthropogenic stress and leads to fewer adverse events compared to no attributability and compared to attribution to a natural cause. Average willingness-to-pay for ex-post attribution is positive. The conjecture that Attribution Science can be behaviorally impactful and socially valuable has empirical merit.
A1  - Diekert, Florian
A1  - Goeschl, Timo
A1  - König-Kersting, Christian
EP  - 53
UR  - https://archiv.ub.uni-heidelberg.de/volltextserver/34341/
ID  - heidok34341
KW  - Extreme event attribution; attribution science; behavioral change; cause dependence; online experiment
AV  - public
CY  - Heidelberg
TI  - The Behavioral Economics of Extreme Event Attribution
Y1  - 2024///
T3  - Discussion Paper Series / University of Heidelberg, Department of Economics
ER  -