Year: 2003
Type: report
Abstract: 1 This paper reports an exercise in a research methodology that we believe is new to experimental economics: adversarial collaboration. An adversarial collaboration is an experiment (or other empirical investigation) carried out jointly by two individuals or research groups who, having proposed conflicting hypotheses, seek to resolve the issue in dispute. The work we describe arises from our attempts to reconcile an apparent difference between the results of two experiments, both of which have been presented as evidence that preferences vary with reference states, and thus as evidence against the received theory of consumer choice. We attempt to settle the question of whether, when consumers consider giving up money in exchange for goods, they feel loss aversion with respect to potential money outlays. This issue in the theory of reference-dependent preferences has direct practical significance, since it bears on the explanation of the widely observed disparity between willingness-to-pay and willingness-to-accept valuations of costs and benefits, which has proved so problematic for contingent valuation studies. This paper can be read on two different levels. At the level of methodology, it pioneers a method of resolving scientific disputes which has wide applicability across
Source: Econstor (Econstor)
Authors: Ian J. Bateman, Daniel Kahneman, Alistair Munro, Robert Sugden, Chris Starmer
Language: English
Subfield: General Decision Sciences
Field: Decision Sciences
Domain: Social Sciences
Open Access status: green
OpenAlex ID: W1954926489