Abstract
Encouraging rural residents to adopt biogas is of great practical significance in tackling environmental degradation in China. Based on the survey data of 540 rural households in Sichuan Province, China, this paper studies the peer effects of biogas adoption in rural households, focusing on the influence of relatives and friends on the biogas adoption behavior of rural households. According to whether there is a Chinese New Year visit, the relatives and friends of rural households are divided into strong ties and weak ties. The peer effects are further discussed from the perspective of strong and weak ties, and the probability score matching (PSM) method is used to correct the estimation errors that may be caused by selection bias. In addition, the study further revealed the internal mechanism of peer effects through heterogeneity analysis. The results found that (1) the adoption of biogas by relatives and friends significantly promotes the adoption of biogas in rural households. (2) Compared with relatives and friends who did not visit during the Chinese New Year (weak ties), relatives and friends who visited (strong ties) had a more significant impact on the biogas adoption behavior of rural families. (3) Farmer groups with lower education levels and farther from the market are more affected by the peer effects and are more likely to adopt biogas. The driving effect of biogas behavior choice of relatives and friends on biogas behavior decision of rural households can provide a reference for decision-makers to make relevant measures.
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The authors extend great gratitude to the anonymous reviewers and editors for their helpful review and critical comments.
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We received financial support from the National Natural Science Foundation of China (41801221), the Special Program for Cultivating Excellent Young Talents under the Dual Support Plan of Sichuan Agricultural University, and the Fundamental Research Funds for the Central Universities (JBK2102018).
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All authors contributed to the study conception and design. Material preparation, data collection, and analysis were performed by Chen Qing, Jia He, Shili Guo, Wenfeng Zhou, Xin Deng, and Dingde Xu. The first draft of the manuscript was written by Chen Qing and Dingde Xu, and all authors commented on previous versions of the manuscript. All authors read and approved the final manuscript.
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Qing, C., He, J., Guo, S. et al. Peer effects on the adoption of biogas in rural households of Sichuan Province, China. Environ Sci Pollut Res 29, 61488–61501 (2022). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11356-022-20232-y
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s11356-022-20232-y