Consumer inattention, heuristic thinking and the role of energy labels
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Date
2016
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Abstract
Energy labels have been introduced in many countries to increase consumers’
attention to energy use in purchase decisions of durables. In a discrete-choice experiment
among about 5,000 households, we implement randomized information
treatments to explore the effects of various kinds of energy labels on purchasing decisions.
Our results show that adding annual operating cost information to the EU
energy label promotes the choice of energy-efficient durables. In addition, we find
that a majority of participants value efficiency classes beyond the economic value
of the underlying energy use differences. Our results further indicate that displaying
operating cost affects choices through two distinct channels: it increases the
attention to operating cost and reduces the valuation of efficiency class differences.
Description
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Keywords
environmental certification, energyusing durables, energy efficiency, discrete choice experiment