Shotaro Nakamura , an assistant professor of agricultural economics in the Department of Agricultural Economics, Sociology, and Education at Penn State, will lead a seminar exploring some consumer beliefs in developing economies.
His free talk - "Beliefs, Signal Quality, and Information Sources: Experimental Evidence on Air Quality in Pakistan" - is scheduled for noon on Wednesday, Nov. 12, in 157 Hosler Building on the University Park campus. It's part of the fall seminar series hosted by the Initiative for Energy and Environmental Economics and Policy (EEEPI).
Nakamura will discuss how the perceived source of environmental information - government or nongovernment - affects beliefs and demand for air-quality forecasts. In his research in Lahore, Pakistan, participants received identical day-ahead forecasts via text message. Only the attributed source of the information varied.
"Subjects exhibit high willingness to pay regardless of source but perceive government forecasts as 12% less accurate," Nakamura said in an abstract. Findings "suggest that source exposure - rather than content alone - shapes consumers' beliefs and preferences, with implications for welfare-enhancing access to environmental information in low-capacity settings."
Nakamura received his doctoral degree in economics from the University of California, Davis. He is interested in the demand for environmental goods and services in developed and developing-economy contexts.
His studies include how information and policy interventions help address frictions and failures in markets for tools to defend individuals against environmental degradation. Nakamura also studies the roles of information technologies and public policy in addressing frictions and failures in emerging marketplaces in developing economics, such as gig-economy and e-commerce platforms.
About EEEPI
Established in 2011, EEEPI operates as a university-wide initiative at Penn State with support from the Earth and Environmental Systems Institute and the Institute of Energy and the Environment. EEEPI seeks to catalyze research in energy and environmental systems economics across the university and to build a world-class group of economists with interests in interdisciplinary collaboration.
