Econ Papers Daily / 期刊论文
纠正消费者对二氧化碳排放的误解
Correcting Consumer Misperceptions about CO 2 Emissions
摘要
Policy makers frequently champion information provision about carbon impact on the premise that consumers are willing to mitigate their emissions but are poorly informed about how to do so. We empirically test this argument and reject it. We collect an extensive new dataset and find both large misperceptions of the carbon impact of different consumption behaviors and clear preferences for mitigation. Yet, in two separate experiments, we show that correcting beliefs has no effect on consumption in large representative samples. Our null results are well-powered and informative, as we target information for maximal impact. These results call into question the potential of correcting carbon footprint misperceptions as a tool to fight climate change.
中文摘要
政策制定者常以消费者愿意减少碳排放但缺乏相关知识为前提，主张提供碳影响信息。我们通过实证检验了这一论点并予以否定。通过收集大量新数据集，我们发现消费者对不同消费行为的碳影响存在严重认知偏差，同时具有明确的减排偏好。然而，在两项独立实验中，我们证明纠正认知偏差对大规模代表性样本的消费行为并无影响。我们的零结果具有充分统计效力且富有信息量，因为所提供的信息针对的是最大影响目标。这些结果对将纠正碳足迹认知偏差作为应对气候变化工具的有效性提出了质疑。