Impact of satisficing behavior in online surveys on consumer preference and welfare estimates

Zhifeng Gao, Lisa House and Xiang Bi

Food Policy, 2016, vol. 64, issue C, 26-36

Abstract: Conducting online surveys through consumer panels has become increasingly popular for researchers to assess consumers’ preferences and attitudes for the purpose of obtaining welfare estimates because they are inexpensive, flexible, and allow for fast feedback. Interestingly, few studies have examined the behaviors of online survey panelists, particularly their satisficing behaviors on welfare measures. This study demonstrates the use of validation questions (trap questions) to detect survey respondents’ satisficing behavior and its impact on consumer choice, willingness to pay (WTP), and consumer surplus (CS) estimates. We find that respondents who fail a validation question (VQ) are more likely to violate the weak axiom of revealed preferences (WARP) in the choice experiment. The estimates for preference parameters, WTP, and CS are statistically different between those who pass and those who fail the VQ. In addition, the WTP and CS from respondents passing the VQ in general have smaller variances than those from respondents failing the VQ. These results indicate that without controlling for potential satisficing behaviors, online surveys may produce less efficient estimates (estimates with larger variance) of welfare measures.

Keywords: Survey data quality; Choice experiment; Willingness to pay; Seafood; Validation question; Satisficing behavior (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: D12 Q13 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2016
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (23)

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Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:eee:jfpoli:v:64:y:2016:i:c:p:26-36

DOI: 10.1016/j.foodpol.2016.09.001

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