Downstream Pollution 2: Does Framing Affect Genders Differently?

Authors

Marianna Khachaturyan, University of Nebraska-LincolnFollow
Natalia Czap, University of Michigan - DearbornFollow
Gary D. Lynne, University of Nebraska-LincolnFollow

Date of this Version

8-17-2016

Document Type

Article

Citation

Cornhusker Economics August 17, 2016

Comments

Copyright 2016 University of Nebraska-Lincoln

Abstract

About a year ago we published the article “Downstream Pollution: Do Gender and Emotion Matter” (Cornhusker Economics, September 23, 2015) reporting the gender effects with respect to expressing positive and negative emotions in the downstream pollution game. We found that expressing positive emotions does not result in higher levels of conservation and, thus, does not significantly affect the quality of downstream water regardless of the gender of the polluter. At the same time, expressing negative emotions was more effective in increasing conservation and achieving cleaner water downstream. Notably, in contrast to our expectations, men responded to negative emotions with a larger increase in conservation levels than women did. In this article, we further explore the gender differences in the environmental context; specifically, we test whether framing affects women and men differently.