Speaker
Description
We investigate why farmers actively avoid information related to the environment and how it affects the effectiveness of information campaigns. We administered a preregistered experiment on a sample of European farmers and foresters from Italy, Belgium, Lithuania, and Finland. We collected two samples: one where respondents could skip climate change information and another composed of a control group and a treatment group where respondents are shown climate change information. Around 34\% of farmers and forest owners actively avoid the information in the first sample. Distrust in scientists and low pro-environmental attitudes correlate positively with information avoidance. The information nudge increases respondents' willingness to implement environmentally sustainable practices in the second sample. Using machine learning, we find that those with a similar profile to the information seekers of the first sample drive the effect of the nudge. Our results suggest that the null effects of information nudges found in the literature might be explained by information avoidance, creating hidden heterogeneity.
| Keywords | Motivated beliefs ; sustainable farming ; Information provision ; Survey experiment |
|---|---|
| Status of your work | First results |
| Early Career Researcher Award | Yes, the paper is eligible |
