IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/tpr/restat/v103y2021i4p605-620.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Do People Avoid Morally Relevant Information? Evidence from the Refugee Crisis

Author

Listed:
  • Eleonora Freddi

    (Telenor Research, Telenor Group)

Abstract

Combining click data from a Swedish newspaper and administrative data on asylum seekers in Sweden, I examine whether a larger presence of refugees in a municipality induces people to avoid news that may encourage welcoming the newcomers. Exploiting the unexpected inflow of refugees to Sweden during 2015 and their exogenous allocation across Swedish municipalities, I find that people living in municipalities where the relative number of refugees is larger read fewer articles about asylum seekers. The decrease in clicks is 36% larger for more empathic articles and is correlated with less engagement in activities aimed at welcoming refugees.

Suggested Citation

  • Eleonora Freddi, 2021. "Do People Avoid Morally Relevant Information? Evidence from the Refugee Crisis," The Review of Economics and Statistics, MIT Press, vol. 103(4), pages 605-620, October.
    • Handle: RePEc:tpr:restat:v:103:y:2021:i:4:p:605-620
    DOI: 10.1162/rest_a_00934
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://doi.org/10.1162/rest_a_00934
    Download Restriction: Access to PDF is restricted to subscribers.
    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.1162/rest_a_00934?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 look for a different version below or search for a different version of it.

    Other versions of this item:

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Emily Oster & Ira Shoulson & E. Ray Dorsey, 2013. "Optimal Expectations and Limited Medical Testing: Evidence from Huntington Disease," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 103(2), pages 804-830, April.
    2. Nyborg, Karine, 2011. "I don't want to hear about it: Rational ignorance among duty-oriented consumers," Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, Elsevier, vol. 79(3), pages 263-274, August.
    3. Christian Dustmann & Kristine Vasiljeva & Anna Piil Damm, 2019. "Refugee Migration and Electoral Outcomes," The Review of Economic Studies, Review of Economic Studies Ltd, vol. 86(5), pages 2035-2091.
    4. Andreas Steinmayr, 2016. "Exposure to Refugees and Voting for the Far-Right. (Unexpected) Results from Austria," WIFO Working Papers 514, WIFO.
    5. Stefano DellaVigna & John A. List & Ulrike Malmendier, 2012. "Testing for Altruism and Social Pressure in Charitable Giving," The Quarterly Journal of Economics, President and Fellows of Harvard College, vol. 127(1), pages 1-56.
    6. Feiler, Lauren, 2014. "Testing models of information avoidance with binary choice dictator games," Journal of Economic Psychology, Elsevier, vol. 45(C), pages 253-267.
    7. David Roodman, 2009. "How to do xtabond2: An introduction to difference and system GMM in Stata," Stata Journal, StataCorp LP, vol. 9(1), pages 86-136, March.
    8. Hannah Trachtman & Andrew Steinkruger & Mackenzie Wood & Adam Wooster & James Andreoni & James J. Murphy & Justin M. Rao, 2015. "Fair weather avoidance: unpacking the costs and benefits of “Avoiding the Ask”," Journal of the Economic Science Association, Springer;Economic Science Association, vol. 1(1), pages 8-14, July.
    9. James Andreoni & Justin M. Rao & Hannah Trachtman, 2017. "Avoiding the Ask: A Field Experiment on Altruism, Empathy, and Charitable Giving," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 125(3), pages 625-653.
    10. Linda Thunström & Klaas van ’t Veld & Jason F. Shogren & Jonas Nordström, 2014. "On strategic ignorance of environmental harm and social norms," Revue d'économie politique, Dalloz, vol. 124(2), pages 195-214.
    11. Hannah Trachtman & Andrew Steinkruger & Mackenzie Wood & Adam Wooster & James Andreoni & James J. Murphy & Justin M. Rao, 2014. "Fair Weather Avoidance: Unpacking Costs and Benefits in Replication of 'Avoiding the Ask'," NBER Working Papers 20385, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    12. Nekby, Lena & Pettersson-Lidbom, Per, 2012. "Revisiting the Relationship between Ethnic Diversity and Preferences for Redistribution," Research Papers in Economics 2012:9, Stockholm University, Department of Economics.
    13. Matz Dahlberg & Karin Edmark & Heléne Lundqvist, 2012. "Ethnic Diversity and Preferences for Redistribution," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 120(1), pages 41-76.
    14. Matthew Gentzkow & Jesse M. Shapiro, 2010. "What Drives Media Slant? Evidence From U.S. Daily Newspapers," Econometrica, Econometric Society, vol. 78(1), pages 35-71, January.
    15. Zachary Grossman, 2014. "Strategic Ignorance and the Robustness of Social Preferences," Management Science, INFORMS, vol. 60(11), pages 2659-2665, November.
    16. Anna, Petrenko, 2016. "Мaркування готової продукції як складова частина інформаційного забезпечення маркетингової діяльності підприємств овочепродуктового підкомплексу," Agricultural and Resource Economics: International Scientific E-Journal, Agricultural and Resource Economics: International Scientific E-Journal, vol. 2(1), March.
    17. Magnus Carlsson & Gordon B. Dahl & Dan-Olof Rooth, 2015. "Backlash in Policy Attitudes After the Election of Extreme Political Parties," NBER Working Papers 21062, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    18. Jason Dana & Roberto Weber & Jason Kuang, 2007. "Exploiting moral wiggle room: experiments demonstrating an illusory preference for fairness," Economic Theory, Springer;Society for the Advancement of Economic Theory (SAET), vol. 33(1), pages 67-80, October.
    19. David Roodman, 2006. "How to Do xtabond2," North American Stata Users' Group Meetings 2006 8, Stata Users Group.
    20. repec:feb:framed:0087 is not listed on IDEAS
    21. Lena Nekby & Per Pettersson‐Lidbom, 2017. "Revisiting the Relationship between Ethnic Diversity and Preferences for Redistribution: Comment," Scandinavian Journal of Economics, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 119(2), pages 268-287, April.
    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. Christine L. Exley, 2020. "Using Charity Performance Metrics as an Excuse Not to Give," Management Science, INFORMS, vol. 66(2), pages 553-563, February.
    2. Marta Serra-Garcia & Nora Szech, 2022. "The (In)Elasticity of Moral Ignorance," Management Science, INFORMS, vol. 68(7), pages 4815-4834, July.
    3. Christine L. Exley & Judd B. Kessler, 2017. "Motivated Errors," Harvard Business School Working Papers 18-017, Harvard Business School, revised May 2018.
    4. Robert Stüber, 2020. "The benefit of the doubt: willful ignorance and altruistic punishment," Experimental Economics, Springer;Economic Science Association, vol. 23(3), pages 848-872, September.
    5. Exley, Christine L. & Petrie, Ragan, 2018. "The impact of a surprise donation ask," Journal of Public Economics, Elsevier, vol. 158(C), pages 152-167.
    6. David Klinowski, 2021. "Reluctant donors and their reactions to social information," Experimental Economics, Springer;Economic Science Association, vol. 24(2), pages 515-535, June.
    7. Konstantin Offer & Dorothee Mischkowski & Zoe Rahwan & Christoph Engel, 2024. "Deliberately Ignoring Unfairness: Responses to Uncertain Inequality in the Ultimatum Game," Discussion Paper Series of the Max Planck Institute for Research on Collective Goods 2024_06, Max Planck Institute for Research on Collective Goods.
    8. Stüber, Robert, 2019. "The benefit of the doubt: Willful ignorance and altruistic punishment," Discussion Papers, Research Unit: Market Behavior SP II 2019-215, WZB Berlin Social Science Center.
    9. Hungerman, Daniel & Rinz, Kevin & Weninger, Tim & Yoon, Chungeun, 2018. "Political campaigns and church contributions," Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, Elsevier, vol. 155(C), pages 403-426.
    10. Lind, Jo Thori & Nyborg, Karine & Pauls, Anna, 2019. "Save the planet or close your eyes? Testing strategic ignorance in a charity context," Ecological Economics, Elsevier, vol. 161(C), pages 9-19.
    11. Jonas Nordström & Linda Thunström & Klaas van ’t Veld & Jason F. Shogren & Mariah Ehmke, 2018. "Strategic Ignorance of Health Risk: Its Causes and Policy Consequences," IFRO Working Paper 2018/09, University of Copenhagen, Department of Food and Resource Economics.
    12. Tommaso Colussi & Ingo E. Isphording & Nico Pestel, 2021. "Minority Salience and Political Extremism," American Economic Journal: Applied Economics, American Economic Association, vol. 13(3), pages 237-271, July.
    13. Katharina Momsen & Markus Ohndorf, 2019. "When do people exploit moral wiggle room? An experimental analysis in a market setup," Working Papers 2019-03, Faculty of Economics and Statistics, Universität Innsbruck.
    14. Andreoni, James & Serra-Garcia, Marta, 2021. "Time inconsistent charitable giving," Journal of Public Economics, Elsevier, vol. 198(C).
    15. Shaul Shalvi & Ivan Soraperra & Joël van der Weele & Marie Claire Villeval, 2019. "Shooting the Messenger? Supply and Demand in Markets for Willful Ignorance," Tinbergen Institute Discussion Papers 19-071/I, Tinbergen Institute.
    16. Maja Adena & Steffen Huck, 2020. "Online Fundraising, Self-Image, and the Long-Term Impact of Ask Avoidance," Management Science, INFORMS, vol. 66(2), pages 722-743, February.
    17. Fosgaard, Toke R. & Soetevent, Adriaan R., 2022. "I will donate later! A field experiment on cell phone donations to charity," Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, Elsevier, vol. 202(C), pages 549-565.
    18. Friedrichsen, Jana & Momsen, Katharina & Piasenti, Stefano, 2022. "Ignorance, intention and stochastic outcomes," EconStor Open Access Articles and Book Chapters, ZBW - Leibniz Information Centre for Economics, vol. 100, pages 1-1.
    19. Kesternich, Martin & Römer, Daniel & Flues, Florens, 2019. "The power of active choice: Field experimental evidence on repeated contribution decisions to a carbon offsetting program," European Economic Review, Elsevier, vol. 114(C), pages 76-91.
    20. Damgaard, Mette Trier & Gravert, Christina, 2018. "The hidden costs of nudging: Experimental evidence from reminders in fundraising," Journal of Public Economics, Elsevier, vol. 157(C), pages 15-26.

    More about this item

    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:tpr:restat:v:103:y:2021:i:4:p:605-620. 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: Kelly McDougall (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://direct.mit.edu/journals .

    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.