Strategic ignorance and perceived control
Information can trigger unpleasant emotions. As a result, individuals might be tempted to willfully ignore it. We experimentally investigate whether increasing perceived control can mitigate strategic ignorance. Participants from India were presented with a choice to receive information about the he...
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| Main Authors: | , , , |
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| Format: | Book/Monograph Working Paper |
| Language: | English |
| Published: |
Heidelberg
Universitätsbibliothek Heidelberg
18 Aug. 2023
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| Series: | AWI discussion paper series
no. 730 (August 2023) |
| In: |
AWI discussion paper series (no. 730 (August 2023))
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| Subjects: | |
| Online Access: | Resolving-System, kostenfrei: https://nbn-resolving.de/urn:nbn:de:bsz:16-heidok-337330 Verlag, kostenfrei, Volltext: http://www.ub.uni-heidelberg.de/archiv/33733 Resolving-System, kostenfrei: https://nbn-resolving.org/urn:nbn:de:bsz:16-heidok-337330 Langzeitarchivierung Nationalbibliothek, kostenfrei: https://d-nb.info/1299660193/34 Resolving-System, kostenfrei: https://hdl.handle.net/10419/278615 
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| Author Notes: | Anca Balietti, Angelika Budjan, Tillmann Eymess, and Alice Soldà |
| Summary: | Information can trigger unpleasant emotions. As a result, individuals might be tempted to willfully ignore it. We experimentally investigate whether increasing perceived control can mitigate strategic ignorance. Participants from India were presented with a choice to receive information about the health risk associated with air pollution and later asked to recall it. We find that perceived control leads to a substantial improvement in information retention. Moreover, perceived control mostly benefits optimists, who show both a reduction in information avoidance and an increase in information retention. This latter result is confirmed with a US sample. A theoretical framework rationalizes these findings. |
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| Physical Description: | Online Resource |