Polarization in Environmental Donations: Application to Deforestation-Prevention Donation

Dede Long; Hongxing Liu; Rodolfo M. Nayga

doi:10.3368/le.080921-0092R

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Figure 1
Average Willingness to Donate by Information Treatment and Agreeing/Disagreeing Groups

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Table 1

Hypotheses for Information Treatment

	Agreeing Group j (α_j > P_j)	Disagreeing Group k (α_k < P_k)
No information treatment
Information treatment

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Table 2

Demographics Distributions of the Survey Participants and the U.S. Adult Population

Variable	U.S. Population (%)	Survey Sample (%)	z-Score
Age (years)
18–24	9.09	10.83	2.27^*
25–34 (2)	13.79	14.83	1.47
35–44 (3)	12.91	17.50	5.40^***
45–54 (4)	12.43	17.92	5 79^***
55–64 (5)	13.01	17.25	3.99^***
≥65 (6)	16.33	21.67	3.59^***
Female	51.00	52.80	1.25
Ethnicity
White (1)	68.64	67.10	−1.15
Black or African American (2)	13.81	12.10	−1.72
Hispanic (3)	18.73	12.50	−5.53^***
American Indian or Alaska Native (4)	1.25	1.00	−0.79
Asian (5)	6.68	5.10	−2.19^*
Native Hawaiian or Pacific Islander (6)	0.23	0.20	−0.23
Other (7)	9.38	2.00	−8.77^***
Marital Status
Single (1)	37.35	37.30	−0.04
Married (2)	46.54	45.80	−0.52
Divorced (3)	9.28	12.00	3.25^***
Widow(er) (4)	4.93	4.90	−0.04
Education Level
Some high school (1)	N/A	2.00	N/A
GED/high school diploma (2)	27.84	16.30	−8.92^***
Some college (3)	17.50	18.10	0.55
Associate’s degree (4)	10.10	10.50	0.46
Bachelor’s degree (5)	22.51	32.50	8.65^***
Graduate degree (6)	11.32	20.80	10.36^***
Income Level
<$25,000 (1)	18.10	18.60	0.45
$25,000–$49,999 (2)	19.69	23.70	3.49^***
$50,000–$74,999 (3)	12.59	20.30	8.06^***
$75,000–$99,999 (4)	12.17	13.00	0.88
$100,000–$149,999 (5)	15.33	14.60	−0.70
$150,000–$199,999 (6)	7.98	4.50	−4.45^***
≥$200,000 (7)	10.25	5.30	−5.65^***

Note: The ethnicity composition data are from the 2020 U.S. Census. Information for other demographics (i.e., education, income) not available in the 2020 decennial census is from the U.S. Census Bureau, Current Population Survey, 2020. The z-scores are calculated from one-sample proportional tests.
↵* p < 0.05;
** p < 0.01;
↵*** p < 0.001.

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Table 3

Survey Sample Summary Statistics

Variable	No. Observations	Mean (or %)	Std. Dev.
WTD (no info)	600	40.88	35.17
WTD (yes info)	600	42.4	35.65
Expected WTD of others (no info)	600	37.31	28.00
Expected WTD of others (yes info)	600	36.52	27.68
Expected WTD of others (disagree deforestation is a problem)	126	35.64	30.97
Expected WTD of others (agree deforestation is a problem)	1,074	37.06	27.45
Expected WTD of others	1,200	36.91	27.83
Concern: less money (%)
1	72	6
2	69	5.8
3	258	21.5
4	289	24.1
5	512	42.7
Organization choice (%)
Rainforest Alliance	322	26.8
Trees for the Future	385	32.1
World Wildlife Fund	493	41.1
Own forest land (%)	169	14.1
Agree deforestation is a problem (%)	1,074	89.5
Know link to infectious disease	497	41.4
Donated money previously	840	70

Note: To measure how empathetic the survey participants are, we asked them to use the scale from 1 (strongly disagree) to 5 (strongly agree) to indicate to what extent they agree or disagree with the following statement: “Despite how much money I have, I am concerned that there are people who have less money than me.” WTD, willingness to donate.

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Table 4

Test Results of the Theoretical Model Hypotheses

	Agreeing Group j (α_j > P_j)	Disagreeing Group k (α_k < P_k)
No information treatment	(V=22,797, one-tailed paired Wilcoxon signed-rank, p-value=0.0077)	(V=235, one-tailed paired Wilcoxon signed-rank, p-value=0.0627)
Information treatment	(W=66,734, one-tailed unpaired Wilcoxon signed-rank p-value=0.0574)	(W=936.5, one-tailed unpaired Wilcoxon signed-rank, p-value=0.1320)

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Table 5

Weighted Tobit Models’ Estimation Results for Willingness to Donate (WTD)

Dependent Variable: WTD	Without Information (1)	Disagree Deforestation Is a Problem (2)	Agree Deforestation Is a Problem (3)	Full Sample (4)
Constant	−31.849^**	−8.525	−42.208^***	−42.592^***
Constant	(13.260)	(17.768)	(11.121)	(9.614)
Age	0.076	−0.186	0.146^*	0.122
Age	(0.107)	(0.206)	(0.082)	(0.076)
Female	−1.295	1.115	0.509	0.962
Female	(3.280)	(5.306)	(2.420)	(2.207)
Black or African American (2)	1.306	3.156	−4.599	−4.264
Black or African American (2)	(5.239)	(6.429)	(3.762)	(3.414)
Hispanic (3)	3.631	−17.503^*	−2.902	−1.265
Hispanic (3)	(4.626)	(9.748)	(3.587)	(3.303)
American Indian or Alaska Native (4)	49.097^**	8.097	29.170^**	20.399^*
American Indian or Alaska Native (4)	(20.923)	(17.413)	(12.575)	(11.362)
Asian (5)	−6.342		−5.257	−7.436
Asian (5)	(8.775)		(5.383)	(5.027)
Native Hawaiian or Pacific Islander (6)	−1.158		1.675	−0.392
Native Hawaiian or Pacific Islander (6)	(14.884)		(14.619)	(14.206)
Other (7)	2.151		9.842	7.226
Other (7)	(10.215)		(9.778)	(8.346)
Married (2)	−2.258		−5.176^*	−5.091^*
Married (2)	(4.056)		(3.051)	(2.783)
Divorced (3)	4.405		0.210	−0.152
Divorced (3)	(5.403)		(4.443)	(4.023)
Widow(er) (4)	11.073		2.667	2.343
Widow(er) (4)	(8.445)		(5.913)	(5.528)
$25,000–$49,999 (2)	−1.780	10.511	6.894^*	6.832^**
$25,000–$49,999 (2)	(4.885)	(8.393)	(3.650)	(3.378)
$50,000–$74,999 (3)	−1.509	5.765	5.143	4.664
$50,000–$74,999 (3)	(5.493)	(9.299)	(4.222)	(3.883)
$75,000–$99,999 (4)	16.304^***	9.552	18.275^***	17.762^***
$75,000–$99,999 (4)	(6.009)	(10.669)	(4.549)	(4.199)
$100,000–$149,999 (5)	18.697^***	23.511^**	17.015^***	17.994^***
$100,000–$149,999 (5)	(5.851)	(9.324)	(4.405)	(4.005)
$150,000–$199,999 (6)	24.842^***	24.025^**	21.039^***	21.726^***
$150,000–$199,999 (6)	(7.282)	(11.955)	(5.639)	(5.085)
≥$200,000 (7)	3.700	9.783	5.810	9.049^*
≥$200,000 (7)	(7.153)	(8.954)	(5.723)	(4.930)
GED/high school diploma (2)	−15.650	−25.134^*	0.467	−3.404
GED/high school diploma (2)	(10.133)	(14.154)	(8.410)	(7.366)
Some college (3)	−7.558	−40.831^**	−0.719	−5.917
Some college (3)	(10.404)	(17.753)	(8.626)	(7.600)
Associate’s degree (4)	−11.390	−20.518	−0.463	−3.441
Associate’s degree (4)	(10.809)	(16.891)	(8.892)	(7.839)
Bachelor’s degree (5)	−15.353	−36.477^**	−1.022	−5.783
Bachelor’s degree (5)	(10.445)	(15.702)	(8.701)	(7.623)
Graduate degree (6)	−21.239^*	−45.085^***	−4.196	−10.105
Graduate degree (6)	(10.888)	(16.496)	(9.159)	(7.951)
Democrat (2)	5.502	−1.502	4.891	4.822^*
Democrat (2)	(4.003)	(6.450)	(2.994)	(2.742)
Independent (3)	−3.729	10.565	−0.764	0.824
Independent (3)	(4.360)	(6.696)	(3.194)	(2.914)
Something else (4)	−14.401^**	−7.027	−5.696	−6.527
Something else (4)	(7.238)	(14.455)	(5.214)	(4.868)
Information treatment		−10.596^**	4.495^**	2.798
Information treatment		(5.157)	(2.290)	(2.105)
Personal framing treatment	8.475^**	13.205^**	6.756^**	6.615^**
Personal framing treatment	(3.787)	(6.215)	(2.832)	(2.583)
Societal framing treatment	3.268	7.199	0.410	0.917
Societal framing treatment	(3.910)	(6.609)	(2.841)	(2.613)
Donated money previously	7.998^**	4.227	6.252^**	5.690^**
Donated money previously	(3.571)	(6.182)	(2.704)	(2.455)
Concern_less2	23.498^***	16.490	7.753	13.125^**
Concern_less2	(8.973)	(10.449)	(7.281)	(6.119)
Concern_less3	38.388^***	37.186^***	18.068^***	22.504^***
Concern_less3	(7.187)	(8.858)	(6.021)	(5.083)
Concern_less4	38.198^***	33.376^***	27 143^***	29.654^***
Concern_less4	(7.157)	(9.350)	(6.026)	(5.094)
Concern_less5	40.306^***	44.831^***	31.253^***	34.819^***
Concern_less5	(6.929)	(9.176)	(5.825)	(4.930)
Own forest	−0.990	0.709	−0.708	−0.259
Own forest	(4.904)	(6.683)	(3.718)	(3.327)
Deforestation is a problem	−5.884			2.932
Deforestation is a problem	(5.027)			(3.515)
Know the link to infectious disease	6.409^**	5.268	5.413^**	4.984^**
Know the link to infectious disease	(3.217)	(5.847)	(2.389)	(2.211)
Expected WTD of other participants	0.893^***	0.843^***	0.959^***	0.957^***
Expected WTD of other participants	(0.057)	(0.091)	(0.045)	(0.041)
AIC	4,331.64	978.49	7704.38	8671.4
BIC	4,498.72	1,069.25	7,893.59	8,869.92
Log-likelihood	−2,127.82	−457.24	−3,814.19	−4296.7
Deviance	777.22	1,53.71	1,406.62	1,572.67
Total observations	600	126	1,074	1,200
Left-censored	98	33	145	178
Uncensored	413	83	747	830
Right-censored	89	10	182	192
Wald test	432.37	257.98	671.07	826.21

Note: We created sampling weights using the population-level age, education, and income distribution as the target weight to correct for non-representativeness. We then estimated all models based on the sampling weights. Ethnicity is not included in the estimations of column (2), since the deforestation disbeliever group (n = 126) does not have a native Hawaiian population. Results do not change when all other ethnicity groups, except native Hawaiians, are included in the estimation.
↵* p < 0.1;
↵** p < 0.05;
↵*** p < 0.01.

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Table 6

Original and Bootstrapping (2,000 Replications) Subsample Tobit Model Weighted Estimation Results for Key Variables

	Disagree Deforestation Is a Problem (n=126)				Agree Deforestation Is a Problem (n=1,074)
	Original	Boot Bias	Boot Std. Err.	Boot Median	Original	Boot Bias	Boot Std. Err.	Boot Median
Info treatment	−10.596	−1.161	7.243	−11.577	4.495	0.066	2.569	4.623
Personal framing	13.205	0.051	10.234	13.347	6.756	−0.340	3.179	6.513
Societal framing	7.199	−0.389	10.065	6.815	0.410	−0.042	3.031	0.368
Donated money	4.227	0.855	8.916	5.071	6.252	0.005	2.987	6.321
Know the link to infectious diseases	5.268	1.328	9.019	6.242	5.413	−0.171	2.855	5.148
Expected willingness to donate	0.843	−0.030	0.151	0.819	0.959	0.003	0.055	0.961