Present Bias for Monetary and Dietary Rewards: Evidence from Chinese Teenagers

Stephen Cheung, Agnieszka Tymula and Xueting Wang ()
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Xueting Wang: Royal Melbourne Institute of Technology

No 13406, IZA Discussion Papers from Institute of Labor Economics (IZA)

Abstract: Economists model self-control problems through time-inconsistent preferences. Empirical tests of these preferences largely rely on experimental elicitation methods using monetary rewards, with several recent studies failing to find present bias for money. In this paper, we compare estimates of present bias for money with estimates for healthy and unhealthy foods. In a within-subjects longitudinal experiment with 697 low-income Chinese high school students we find strong present bias for both money and food, and that individual measures of present bias are moderately correlated across reward types. Our experimental measures of time preferences over money predict field behaviours better than preferences elicited over foods.

Keywords: food rewards; self-control; quasi-hyperbolic discounting; present bias; adolescents (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: C91 D12 D80 D91 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Pages: 59 pages
Date: 2020-06
New Economics Papers: this item is included in nep-agr, nep-cbe, nep-cna, nep-exp, nep-hea and nep-neu
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (1)

Published - revised version published as 'Present Bias for Monetary and Dietary Rewards' in: Experimental Economics, 2022, 25, 1202–1233

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