Identifying the Impact of Exposure to Armed Conflict on Individual Preferences and Field Behavior: Evidence from Turkish Draft Veterans

Arzu Kıbrıs, Resul Cesur, Neslihan Uler and Sadullah Yıldırım
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Arzu Kıbrıs: University of Warwick, Department of Politics and International Studies.
Resul Cesur: University of Connecticut, IZA & NBER
Neslihan Uler: University of Maryland and University of Michigan
Sadullah Yıldırım: Marmara University

QAPEC Discussion Papers from Quantitative and Analytical Political Economy Research Centre

Abstract: This research identifies the causal impact of exposure to armed conflict on risk, ambiguity and time preferences and related field behaviors for the average male randomly picked from the population. Our study builds on a natural experiment, engendered by the mandatory conscription system and the long-running civil conflict in Turkey, with a survey design that measures preferences through lab-in-he-field-experiments. The setting we explore allows us to analyze the change in preferences without confoundment by community-level effects of conflict. Results show that conflict exposure increases risk tolerance, ambiguity neutrality, patience and time consistency. Tracing the effects on real life behaviors, we find that while conflict exposure leads to an increase in entrepreneurial activity, it has no significant impacts on risky health behaviors such as being overweight, smoking, or daily drinking. Evidence highlights post-traumatic growth in the form of elevated agency as a novel explanation for the observed changes in preferences.

Keywords: Political Violence; Artefactual Field Experiment; Risk Preferences; Ambiguity Preferences; Time Preferences. JEL Codes: C90; C93; D01; D74; D81; I01; O17; Z13 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2025
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Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:wrk:wqapec:27

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