New Publication Announcement
We are excited to share that our lab has published a new paper in Ecological Economics:
Congratulations to the authors—Kristopher L. Nichols, Johanna M. Matt-Navarro, Maxim K. Doiron, Giovanna d’Adda, Elke U. Weber, and Sara M. Constantino—on this important contribution.
In this paper, the authors examine whether economic preferences commonly studied in decision-making research—risk, time, and social preferences—predict real-world environmentally relevant behaviors. Drawing on a systematic review of 75 studies (426 effect sizes) and a meta-analysis of 39 studies across 29 countries, the findings show that these preferences are only modest predictors of sustainable behavior overall. Notably, prosocial preferences emerge as a significant predictor, particularly when preferences are elicited in field settings or framed around real-world impacts. The study also finds stronger relationships when outcomes involve monetary donations to environmental causes.
Together, these results highlight the nuanced role of economic preferences in explaining sustainable behavior and offer important implications for the design of environmental policies and interventions.