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Time Preferences and Medication Adherence: A Field Experiment with Pregnant Women in South Africa

Author

Listed:
  • Christina Gravert

    (CEBI, Department of Economics, University of Copenhagen)

  • Kai Barron

    (WZB Berlin)

  • Mette Trier Damgaard

    (Department of Economics and Business Economics & TrygFonden’s Centre for Child Research, Aarhus University)

  • Lisa Norrgren

    (Department of Economics, University of Gothenburg)

Abstract

The effectiveness of health recommendations and treatment plans depends on the extent to which individuals follow them. For the individual, medication adherence involves an inter-temporal trade-off between expected future health benefits and immediate effort costs. Therefore examining time preferences may help us to understand why some people fail to follow health recommendations and treatment plans. In this paper, we use a simple, real-effort task implemented via text message to elicit the time preferences of pregnant women in South Africa. We find evidence that high discounters are significantly less likely to report to adhere to the recommendation of taking daily iron supplements daily during pregnancy. There is some indication that time-inconsistency also negatively affects adherence. Together our results suggest that measuring time preferences could help predict medication adherence and thus be used to improve preventive health care measures.

Suggested Citation

  • Christina Gravert & Kai Barron & Mette Trier Damgaard & Lisa Norrgren, 2020. "Time Preferences and Medication Adherence: A Field Experiment with Pregnant Women in South Africa," CEBI working paper series 20-29, University of Copenhagen. Department of Economics. The Center for Economic Behavior and Inequality (CEBI).
    • Handle: RePEc:kud:kucebi:2029
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    File URL: https://www.econ.ku.dk/cebi/publikationer/working-papers/CEBI_WP_29-20.pdf
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    References listed on IDEAS

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    Cited by:

    1. Kai Barron & Mette Trier Damgaard & Christina Gravert, 2022. "When Do Reminders Work? Memory Constraints and Medical Adherence," CESifo Working Paper Series 9996, CESifo.
    2. Étienne Dagorn & Martina Dattilo & Matthieu Pourieux, 2022. "Preferences matter! Political Responses to the COVID-19 and Population’s Preferences," Economics Working Paper Archive (University of Rennes & University of Caen) 2022-01, Center for Research in Economics and Management (CREM), University of Rennes, University of Caen and CNRS.

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    More about this item

    Keywords

    time preferences; medication adherence; field experiment;
    All these keywords.

    JEL classification:

    • C93 - Mathematical and Quantitative Methods - - Design of Experiments - - - Field Experiments
    • D91 - Microeconomics - - Micro-Based Behavioral Economics - - - Role and Effects of Psychological, Emotional, Social, and Cognitive Factors on Decision Making
    • I12 - Health, Education, and Welfare - - Health - - - Health Behavior

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