IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/eee/jeborg/v97y2014icp204-218.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

The roles of risk and ambiguity in technology adoption

Author

Listed:
  • Barham, Bradford L.
  • Chavas, Jean-Paul
  • Fitz, Dylan
  • Salas, Vanessa Ríos
  • Schechter, Laura

Abstract

We study the impacts of risk and ambiguity aversion on the adoption of new technologies, specifically genetically modified (GM) corn and soy seeds. We conduct experiments measuring risk and ambiguity aversion with Midwestern grain farmers. Risk aversion has only a small impact on the timing of adoption of GM soy, while ambiguity-aversion has a large impact speeding up farmer adoption of GM corn. We hypothesize that this unusual finding is due to the fact that GM corn often contains an insect-resistance trait which reduces the ambiguity of pest damages for adopters. GM soy never contains this insect-resistance trait. This highlights the importance of distinguishing between risk and ambiguity when studying the effects of aversion to uncertainty on adoption of new technologies.

Suggested Citation

  • Barham, Bradford L. & Chavas, Jean-Paul & Fitz, Dylan & Salas, Vanessa Ríos & Schechter, Laura, 2014. "The roles of risk and ambiguity in technology adoption," Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, Elsevier, vol. 97(C), pages 204-218.
    • Handle: RePEc:eee:jeborg:v:97:y:2014:i:c:p:204-218
    DOI: 10.1016/j.jebo.2013.06.014
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0167268113001662
    Download Restriction: Full text for ScienceDirect subscribers only
    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.1016/j.jebo.2013.06.014?utm_source=ideas
    LibKey link: if access is restricted and if your library uses this service, LibKey will redirect you to where you can use your library subscription to access this item
    ---><---

    As the access to this document is restricted, you may want to search for a different version of it.

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Thomas Dohmen & Armin Falk & David Huffman & Uwe Sunde, 2010. "Are Risk Aversion and Impatience Related to Cognitive Ability?," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 100(3), pages 1238-1260, June.
    2. Hans P. Binswanger, 1980. "Attitudes Toward Risk: Experimental Measurement in Rural India," American Journal of Agricultural Economics, Agricultural and Applied Economics Association, vol. 62(3), pages 395-407.
    3. Marra, Michele & Pannell, David J. & Abadi Ghadim, Amir, 2003. "The economics of risk, uncertainty and learning in the adoption of new agricultural technologies: where are we on the learning curve?," Agricultural Systems, Elsevier, vol. 75(2-3), pages 215-234.
    4. Keith O. Fuglie & Catherine A. Kascak, 2001. "Adoption and Diffusion of Natural-Resource-Conserving Agricultural Technology," Review of Agricultural Economics, Agricultural and Applied Economics Association, vol. 23(2), pages 386-403.
    5. Feder, Gershon & Just, Richard E & Zilberman, David, 1985. "Adoption of Agricultural Innovations in Developing Countries: A Survey," Economic Development and Cultural Change, University of Chicago Press, vol. 33(2), pages 255-298, January.
    6. Simeon Djankov & Edward Miguel & Yingyi Qian & Gérard Roland & Ekaterina Zhuravskaya, 2005. "Who are Russia's Entrepreneurs?," Journal of the European Economic Association, MIT Press, vol. 3(2-3), pages 587-597, 04/05.
    7. Juan Camilo Cardenas & Jeffrey Carpenter, 2008. "Behavioural Development Economics: Lessons from Field Labs in the Developing World," Journal of Development Studies, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 44(3), pages 311-338.
    8. Engle Warnick James C. & Escobal Javier & Laszlo Sonia C., 2011. "Ambiguity Aversion and Portfolio Choice in Small-Scale Peruvian Farming," The B.E. Journal of Economic Analysis & Policy, De Gruyter, vol. 11(1), pages 1-56, November.
    9. Charles A. Holt & Susan K. Laury, 2002. "Risk Aversion and Incentive Effects," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 92(5), pages 1644-1655, December.
    10. Roger Sherman, 1974. "The Psychological Difference Between Ambiguity and Risk," The Quarterly Journal of Economics, President and Fellows of Harvard College, vol. 88(1), pages 166-169.
    11. Rigotti, Luca & Ryan, Matthew & Vaithianathan, Rema, 2001. "Entrepreneurial Innovation," Department of Economics, Working Paper Series qt508109h4, Department of Economics, Institute for Business and Economic Research, UC Berkeley.
    12. Camerer, Colin & Weber, Martin, 1992. "Recent Developments in Modeling Preferences: Uncertainty and Ambiguity," Journal of Risk and Uncertainty, Springer, vol. 5(4), pages 325-370, October.
    13. Suresh de Mel & David McKenzie & Christopher Woodruff, 2009. "Returns to Capital in Microenterprises: Evidence from a Field Experiment," The Quarterly Journal of Economics, President and Fellows of Harvard College, vol. 124(1), pages 423-423.
    14. Urs Fischbacher, 2007. "z-Tree: Zurich toolbox for ready-made economic experiments," Experimental Economics, Springer;Economic Science Association, vol. 10(2), pages 171-178, June.
    15. repec:feb:artefa:0086 is not listed on IDEAS
    16. Falk, Armin & Zehnder, Christian & Meier, Stephan, 2010. "Did We Overestimate the Role of Social Preferences? The Case of Self-Selected Student Samples," CEPR Discussion Papers 8019, C.E.P.R. Discussion Papers.
    17. Pilar Useche & Bradford L. Barham & Jeremy D. Foltz, 2006. "Integrating Technology Traits and Producer Heterogeneity: A Mixed-Multinomial Model of Genetically Modified Corn Adoption," American Journal of Agricultural Economics, Agricultural and Applied Economics Association, vol. 91(2), pages 444-461.
    18. Feder, Gershon, 1980. "Farm Size, Risk Aversion and the Adoption of New Technology under Uncertainty," Oxford Economic Papers, Oxford University Press, vol. 32(2), pages 263-283, July.
    19. Harrison, Glenn W. & Lau, Morten I. & Elisabet Rutström, E., 2009. "Risk attitudes, randomization to treatment, and self-selection into experiments," Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, Elsevier, vol. 70(3), pages 498-507, June.
    20. Steven D. Levitt & John A. List, 2009. "Can Field Experiments Return Agricultural Economics to the Glory Days?," American Journal of Agricultural Economics, Agricultural and Applied Economics Association, vol. 91(5), pages 1259-1265.
    21. Fox, Craig R. & Weber, Martin, 2002. "Ambiguity Aversion, Comparative Ignorance, and Decision Context," Organizational Behavior and Human Decision Processes, Elsevier, vol. 88(1), pages 476-498, May.
    22. Anderson, Jon E. & Burks, Stephen V. & Carpenter, Jeffrey P. & Götte, Lorenz & Maurer, Karsten & Nosenzo, Daniele & Potter, Ruth & Rocha, Kim & Rustichini, Aldo, 2010. "Self Selection Does Not Increase Other-Regarding Preferences among Adult Laboratory Subjects, but Student Subjects May Be More Self-Regarding than Adults," IZA Discussion Papers 5389, Institute of Labor Economics (IZA).
    23. Yoram Halevy, 2007. "Ellsberg Revisited: An Experimental Study," Econometrica, Econometric Society, vol. 75(2), pages 503-536, March.
    24. Peter Klibanoff & Massimo Marinacci & Sujoy Mukerji, 2005. "A Smooth Model of Decision Making under Ambiguity," Econometrica, Econometric Society, vol. 73(6), pages 1849-1892, November.
    25. Love, Ross O. & Robison, Lindon J., 1984. "An Empirical Analysis Of The Intertemporal Stability Of Risk Preference," Southern Journal of Agricultural Economics, Southern Agricultural Economics Association, vol. 16(1), pages 1-7, July.
    26. William Lin & G. W. Dean & C. V. Moore, 1974. "An Empirical Test of Utility vs. Profit Maximization in Agricultural Production," American Journal of Agricultural Economics, Agricultural and Applied Economics Association, vol. 56(3), pages 497-508.
    27. Murat Isik & Madhu Khanna, 2003. "Stochastic Technology, Risk Preferences, and Adoption of Site-Specific Technologies," American Journal of Agricultural Economics, Agricultural and Applied Economics Association, vol. 85(2), pages 305-317.
    28. Gilboa, Itzhak & Schmeidler, David, 1989. "Maxmin expected utility with non-unique prior," Journal of Mathematical Economics, Elsevier, vol. 18(2), pages 141-153, April.
    29. Andrew D. Foster & Mark R. Rosenzweig, 2010. "Microeconomics of Technology Adoption," Annual Review of Economics, Annual Reviews, vol. 2(1), pages 395-424, September.
    30. Sarah Jacobson & Ragan Petrie, 2009. "Learning from mistakes: What do inconsistent choices over risk tell us?," Journal of Risk and Uncertainty, Springer, vol. 38(2), pages 143-158, April.
    31. Zengjing Chen & Larry Epstein, 2002. "Ambiguity, Risk, and Asset Returns in Continuous Time," Econometrica, Econometric Society, vol. 70(4), pages 1403-1443, July.
    32. Kiefer, Nicholas M, 1988. "Economic Duration Data and Hazard Functions," Journal of Economic Literature, American Economic Association, vol. 26(2), pages 646-679, June.
    33. Akay, Alpaslan & Martinsson, Peter & Medhin, Haileselassie & Trautmann, Stefan T., 2009. "Attitudes toward Uncertainty among the Poor: Evidence from Rural Ethiopia," IZA Discussion Papers 4225, Institute of Labor Economics (IZA).
    34. Sunding, David & Zilberman, David, 2001. "The agricultural innovation process: Research and technology adoption in a changing agricultural sector," Handbook of Agricultural Economics, in: B. L. Gardner & G. C. Rausser (ed.), Handbook of Agricultural Economics, edition 1, volume 1, chapter 4, pages 207-261, Elsevier.
    35. Craig R. Fox & Amos Tversky, 1995. "Ambiguity Aversion and Comparative Ignorance," The Quarterly Journal of Economics, President and Fellows of Harvard College, vol. 110(3), pages 585-603.
    36. Alpaslan Akay & Peter Martinsson & Haileselassie Medhin & Stefan Trautmann, 2012. "Attitudes toward uncertainty among the poor: an experiment in rural Ethiopia," Theory and Decision, Springer, vol. 73(3), pages 453-464, September.
    37. Daniel Ellsberg, 1961. "Risk, Ambiguity, and the Savage Axioms," The Quarterly Journal of Economics, President and Fellows of Harvard College, vol. 75(4), pages 643-669.
    38. Shane Frederick, 2005. "Cognitive Reflection and Decision Making," Journal of Economic Perspectives, American Economic Association, vol. 19(4), pages 25-42, Fall.
    39. William Neilson, 2010. "A simplified axiomatic approach to ambiguity aversion," Journal of Risk and Uncertainty, Springer, vol. 41(2), pages 113-124, October.
    40. Daniel J. Benjamin & Sebastian A. Brown & Jesse M. Shapiro, 2013. "Who Is ‘Behavioral’? Cognitive Ability And Anomalous Preferences," Journal of the European Economic Association, European Economic Association, vol. 11(6), pages 1231-1255, December.
    41. François Rebaudo & Olivier Dangles, 2011. "Coupled Information Diffusion–Pest Dynamics Models Predict Delayed Benefits of Farmer Cooperation in Pest Management Programs," PLOS Computational Biology, Public Library of Science, vol. 7(10), pages 1-10, October.
    42. John Knight & Sharada Weir & Tassew Woldehanna, 2003. "The role of education in facilitating risk-taking and innovation in agriculture," Journal of Development Studies, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 39(6), pages 1-22.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Ahsanuzzaman, & Priyo, Asad Karim Khan & Nuzhat, Kanti Ananta, 2022. "Effects of communication, group selection, and social learning on risk and ambiguity attitudes: Experimental evidence from Bangladesh," Journal of Behavioral and Experimental Economics (formerly The Journal of Socio-Economics), Elsevier, vol. 96(C).
    2. Jim Engle-Warnick & Sonia Laszlo, 2017. "Learning-by-doing in an ambiguous environment," Journal of Risk and Uncertainty, Springer, vol. 55(1), pages 71-94, August.
    3. Jeffrey Butler & Luigi Guiso & Tullio Jappelli, 2014. "The role of intuition and reasoning in driving aversion to risk and ambiguity," Theory and Decision, Springer, vol. 77(4), pages 455-484, December.
    4. Galarza, Francisco, 2009. "Choices under Risk in Rural Peru," MPRA Paper 17708, University Library of Munich, Germany.
    5. Freudenreich, H., 2018. "Explaining Mexican Farmers Adoption of Hybrid Maize Seed - The Role of Social Psychology, Risk and Ambiguity Aversion," 2018 Conference, July 28-August 2, 2018, Vancouver, British Columbia 277410, International Association of Agricultural Economists.
    6. Prokosheva, Sasha, 2016. "Comparing decisions under compound risk and ambiguity: The importance of cognitive skills," Journal of Behavioral and Experimental Economics (formerly The Journal of Socio-Economics), Elsevier, vol. 64(C), pages 94-105.
    7. Belissa, Temesgen Keno & Lensink, Robert & van Asseldonk, Marcel, 2020. "Risk and ambiguity aversion behavior in index-based insurance uptake decisions: Experimental evidence from Ethiopia," Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, Elsevier, vol. 180(C), pages 718-730.
    8. Crentsil, Christian & Gschwandtner, Adelina & Wahhaj, Zaki, 2020. "The effects of risk and ambiguity aversion on technology adoption: Evidence from aquaculture in Ghana," Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, Elsevier, vol. 179(C), pages 46-68.
    9. Ward, Patrick S. & Singh, Vartika, 2013. "Risk and Ambiguity Preferences and the Adoption of New Agricultural Technologies: Evidence from Field Experiments in Rural India," 2013 Annual Meeting, August 4-6, 2013, Washington, D.C. 150794, Agricultural and Applied Economics Association.
    10. Füllbrunn, Sascha & Rau, Holger A. & Weitzel, Utz, 2014. "Does ambiguity aversion survive in experimental asset markets?," Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, Elsevier, vol. 107(PB), pages 810-826.
    11. Bradford L. Barham & Jean-Paul Chavas & Dylan Fitz & Vanessa Ríos-Salas & Laura Schechter, 2015. "Risk, learning, and technology adoption," Agricultural Economics, International Association of Agricultural Economists, vol. 46(1), pages 11-24, January.
    12. Mohan, Sarah, 2020. "Risk aversion and certification: Evidence from the Nepali tea fields," World Development, Elsevier, vol. 129(C).
    13. Milos Borozan & Loreta Cannito & Barbara Luppi, 2022. "A tale of two ambiguities: A conceptual overview of findings from economics and psychology," Journal of Behavioral Economics for Policy, Society for the Advancement of Behavioral Economics (SABE), vol. 6(S1), pages 11-21, July.
    14. Wu, Haixia & Ge, Yan & Li, Jianping, 2023. "Uncertainty, time preference and households’ adoption of rooftop photovoltaic technology," Energy, Elsevier, vol. 276(C).
    15. Gary Charness & Edi Karni & Dan Levin, 2013. "Ambiguity attitudes and social interactions: An experimental investigation," Journal of Risk and Uncertainty, Springer, vol. 46(1), pages 1-25, February.
    16. Yang, Chun-Lei & Yao, Lan, 2011. "Ellsberg Paradox and Second-order Preference Theories on Ambiguity: Some New Experimental Evidence," MPRA Paper 28531, University Library of Munich, Germany.
    17. Tamás Csermely & Alexander Rabas, 2016. "How to reveal people’s preferences: Comparing time consistency and predictive power of multiple price list risk elicitation methods," Journal of Risk and Uncertainty, Springer, vol. 53(2), pages 107-136, December.
    18. Elaine M. Liu, 2013. "Time to Change What to Sow: Risk Preferences and Technology Adoption Decisions of Cotton Farmers in China," The Review of Economics and Statistics, MIT Press, vol. 95(4), pages 1386-1403, October.
    19. M. Vittoria Levati & Stefan Napel & Ivan Soraperra, 2017. "Collective Choices Under Ambiguity," Group Decision and Negotiation, Springer, vol. 26(1), pages 133-149, January.
    20. Oechssler, Jörg & Roomets, Alex, 2015. "A test of mechanical ambiguity," Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, Elsevier, vol. 119(C), pages 153-162.

    More about this item

    Keywords

    Risk aversion; Ambiguity aversion; Technology adoption; Genetically modified (GM) seeds;
    All these keywords.

    JEL classification:

    • C91 - Mathematical and Quantitative Methods - - Design of Experiments - - - Laboratory, Individual Behavior
    • D81 - Microeconomics - - Information, Knowledge, and Uncertainty - - - Criteria for Decision-Making under Risk and Uncertainty
    • O33 - Economic Development, Innovation, Technological Change, and Growth - - Innovation; Research and Development; Technological Change; Intellectual Property Rights - - - Technological Change: Choices and Consequences; Diffusion Processes
    • Q12 - Agricultural and Natural Resource Economics; Environmental and Ecological Economics - - Agriculture - - - Micro Analysis of Farm Firms, Farm Households, and Farm Input Markets
    • Q16 - Agricultural and Natural Resource Economics; Environmental and Ecological Economics - - Agriculture - - - R&D; Agricultural Technology; Biofuels; Agricultural Extension Services

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:eee:jeborg:v:97:y:2014:i:c:p:204-218. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Catherine Liu (email available below). General contact details of provider: http://www.elsevier.com/locate/jebo .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.