Information Preferences and Corresponding Consumption Behavior in Common Pool Resource Management
Abstract
For the purpose of managing a common pool resource (CPR), it may be crucial to know what kind of information is important to the actors involved. The present study tests a set of hypotheses from the social ecological relevance (SER) model of decision-making in commons dilemma situations. The results showed that (1) information about the resource increased in importance with decreasing resource availability, (2) this increase was more pronounced in the presence of high ecological uncertainty, and (3) individuals attributing the availability of the resource to the group attached more importance to information on others’ behavior. These findings were reflected by the results on consumption behavior, as (1) the average consumption decreased with decreasing resource availability, (2) it decreased more pronounced in the presence of high ecological uncertainty, and (3) individuals attributing the availability of the resource to the group were more inclined to follow the group’s consumption than individuals attributing to the resource.
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