Grantee Research Project Results
2001 Progress Report: Environmental Risks to Children's Health: Parents' Risk Beliefs, Protective Behavior, and Willingness to Pay
EPA Grant Number: R828717Title: Environmental Risks to Children's Health: Parents' Risk Beliefs, Protective Behavior, and Willingness to Pay
Investigators: Dickie, Mark , Gerking, Shelby
Institution: University of Southern Mississippi
Current Institution: University of Southern Mississippi , University of Wyoming
EPA Project Officer: Hahn, Intaek
Project Period: January 1, 2001 through December 31, 2003
Project Period Covered by this Report: January 1, 2001 through December 31, 2002
Project Amount: $347,373
RFA: Valuation of Children's Health Effects (2000) RFA Text | Recipients Lists
Research Category: Human Health , Children's Health , Environmental Justice
Objective:
This research project extends prior work on formation of risk beliefs and willingness-to-pay to avoid skin cancer by analyzing decisions that parents make concerning their own health, the health of their children, and the health of others outside their immediate family. Five considerations will be addressed: (1) what determines parents? (ex ante) subjective beliefs about their own and their children?s risk of contracting skin cancer; (2) what protective actions do adults take to reduce risks of skin cancer to themselves and to their children; (3) how much are parents willing to pay (ex ante) to reduce their own and their children?s risk of contracting skin cancer; (4) the willingness of parents to pay an additional sum to protect the world?s population from skin cancer; and (5) how income, family structure and composition, parental education, and other characteristics affect willingness-to-pay, risk beliefs, and risk-related behaviors.
Progress Summary:
The pilot survey discussed in the proposal was conducted (without funds from
this grant) prior to the reporting period. Analysis of data from the pilot survey
yielded some substantive results pertaining to risk beliefs, protective actions,
and willingness-to-pay. More importantly, the experience with the pilot survey
led to significant improvements in survey design. Substantive results include:
(1) parents believe their own lifetime risk of skin cancer is higher than their
children's lifetime risk; (2) parents' beliefs about their children's risks
are quite sensitive to their beliefs about their own risks; (3) in forming skin
cancer risk beliefs about their children, parents account for exposure and protective
behavior, but otherwise ignore risk factors identified by health scientists;
(4) parents over-estimate risks to themselves and their children (the extent
of over-estimation is reduced when parents are provided with risk information);
and (5) parents are willing to pay more to reduce risk to their children than
to themselves.
The pilot survey has been revised and programmed for computer administration.
Based on experience with the pilot, five major improvements were made to the
design of the survey:
· In the valuation component of the survey, risk reductions now are assigned to respondents. This revision makes the survey simpler for respondents; it makes risk reductions to the parent and child orthogonal over the sample, and avoids the need to apply instrumental-variables methods.
· The revised survey is designed to allow separate estimation of willingness-to-pay to reduce risks of morbidity and mortality from skin cancer.
· The revised survey collects information on parents' beliefs about latency, and will support tests for the effect of latency on willingness-to-pay to reduce risk.
· Risk beliefs now are elicited using interactive grid squares rather than the risk ladders used in the pilot survey. Interactive grid squares allows finer resolution of risk beliefs than was possible using the ladders.
· The revised survey takes less time, an average of 30 minutes to complete compared to 45 minutes for the pilot.
Three rounds of pre-tests were conducted with a total of 28 respondents while revising the survey into its final form. Procedures for data storage, security, and retrieval also were tested and implemented. Data collection began in May 2002, and slightly more than 5 percent of the 600 surveys now have been completed.
Future Activities:
Survey data collection should be completed in August. At that time, an application to transfer the grant to the University of Central Florida will be submitted, because both investigators now are employed there. Data from the survey will be analyzed during the period covered by the next annual report, results will be disseminated in papers and presentations, and the second survey will be designed.
Journal Articles:
No journal articles submitted with this report: View all 8 publications for this projectSupplemental Keywords:
morbidity valuation, nonmarket valuation, survey, benefit estimation, willingness-to-pay, risk perception., RFA, Health, Scientific Discipline, Air, Geographic Area, air toxics, State, Economics, Susceptibility/Sensitive Population/Genetic Susceptibility, Children's Health, Ecology and Ecosystems, Ecological Risk Assessment, genetic susceptability, Social Science, level of education, benefits transfer, risk assessment, sensitive populations, WY, stratospheric ozone, behavioral assessment, environmental risks, measuring childhood exposure, children's health values, Mississippi (MS), family values, environmental values, survey, children, adult valuation of children's health, modeling parental behavior, willingness to pay (WTP), morbidity valuation, environmental health hazard, Wyoming, skin cancer, environmental effects, willingness to pay, toxicsProgress and Final Reports:
Original AbstractThe perspectives, information and conclusions conveyed in research project abstracts, progress reports, final reports, journal abstracts and journal publications convey the viewpoints of the principal investigator and may not represent the views and policies of ORD and EPA. Conclusions drawn by the principal investigators have not been reviewed by the Agency.