Essays on Communication and Behaviour Under Risk and Ambiguity

This dissertation consists of three chapters focusing on behaviour under risk and ambiguity. The first chapter analysed the best method to communicate risk information to weather forecast users whilst the last two analysed smallholder farmers’ and students’ decision making on crop selection when presented with uncertainty information of drought. In the first chapter, experimental economics methods were used to assess forecast user understanding of information in temperature forecast. We tested whether undergraduate students presented with uncertainty information (90th percent confidence intervals) in a table and bar graph format were able to correctly understand the forecast and use the extra information to choose the “correct" (most probable) outcome than if they are presented with a deterministic forecast. Participants from the University of Exeter were asked to choose the most probable temperature outcome between a set of “lotteries” based on the temperature up to five days ahead. If they chose a true statement, participants were rewarded with a cash payment. Results indicate that on average participants provided with uncertainty information performed better than those without. Statistical analysis indicates a possible learning effect as the experiment progressed. The second chapter assesses if there are gender differences in the behaviour of smallholder Zimbabwean farmers when faced with risk and ambiguity. The risk and ambiguity preferences of male and female farmers were elicited using a modified Holt and Laury (2002) field experiment. Farmers were asked to choose whether or not to adopt a new drought tolerant variety under different probabilities of a drought occurring. Subjects in one group were presented with known probabilities whilst another group was presented with ambiguous probabilities (range). Most of the farmers’ exhibited extreme ambiguity and risk aversion and female farmers were more averse. Results indicate heterogeneity and the need to disaggregate samples when analysing research results as there maybe underlying factors affecting different groups. The third chapter elicited the risk and ambiguity attitudes of vocational college students in Zimbabwe. Results indicate that in general, students were both risk averse and ambiguity averse. Those presented with the risk treatment were less risk averse compared with those shown the ambiguity treatment. Participants who were presented with the ambiguity treatment behaved as pessimists and perhaps made decisions based on probability of drought that was higher than the provided centre of the range. We found gender differences in risk attitudes: contrary to the norm, female participants were less risk averse compared to their male counterparts. This is however when all subjects are pooled together. Results also indicate that a higher certain payoff perhaps incentivises consistency and increases risk aversion. The data seems to indicate anchoring effects from varying the order the probability of drought was presented.UK Met OfficeUniversity of Exeter Business Schoo

Sources and types of banana planting materials used by farmers in Uganda and Tanzania

This report provides an overview of the types and sources of planting material used by 1315 farmers in Uganda and Tanzania. The data was collected from six dristricts; Luwero and Mbarara in Uganda and Meru, Moshi, Bukoba and Rungwe in Tanzania. Nearly all farmers who participated in the study used suckers which they obtained them from their own farms or from friends and neighbours. Suckers are more readily available, exchanged for free or affordable and accessible to farmers. The results highlight the limited uptake of other planting material types that are mostly provided by formal institutions as evidenced by the low numbers of farmers who indicated that they used tissue culture and macropropagated plantlets. Possible sources of tissue culture and macropropagated planting materials include research stations, private sector and non-governmental organizations, which were the least used sources. Nevertheless, 38 farmers (which is still a relatively low number) from Luwero district in Uganda reported that they used tissue culture plantlets which they mostly obtained from agricultural extension services. Results show that social ties and cultural norms influence banana planting material types and sources. There is very little diffusion and use of alternative source and types that are considered formal

Communication of uncertainty in weather forecasts

Experimental economics methods were used to assess public understanding of information in weather forecasts and test whether the participants were able to make better decisions using the probabilistic information presented in table or bar graph formats than if they are presented with a deterministic forecast. We asked undergraduate students from the University of Exeter to choose the most probable temperature outcome between a set of “lotteries” based on the temperature up to five days ahead. If they choose a true statement, participants were rewarded with a cash reward. Results indicate that on average participants provided with uncertainty information make better decisions than those without. Statistical analysis indicates a possible learning effect as the experiment progressed. Furthermore, participants who were shown the graph with uncertainty information took on average less response time compared to those who were shown a table with uncertainty information

Communication of uncertainty in weather forecasts

Experimental economics methods were used to assess public understanding of information in weather forecasts and test whether the participants were able to make better decisions using the probabilistic information presented in table or bar graph formats than if they are presented with a deterministic forecast. We asked undergraduate students from the University of Exeter to choose the most probable temperature outcome between a set of “lotteries” based on the temperature up to five days ahead. If they choose a true statement, participants were rewarded with a cash reward. Results indicate that on average participants provided with uncertainty information make better decisions than those without. Statistical analysis indicates a possible learning effect as the experiment progressed. Furthermore, participants who were shown the graph with uncertainty information took on average less response time compared to those who were shown a table with uncertainty information

Enabling cumulative learning in user-oriented research for root, tuber and banana crop breeding.

User-oriented research is important in breeding improved genotypes, for developing and validating product concepts (mostly involving trait prioritisation), as well as evaluating breeding products in use situations (mostly involving participatory variety evaluation). This paper examines key aspects that enable cumulative learning in user-oriented research for root, tuber and banana (RTB) crop breeding. We reviewed empirical user-oriented studies on RTB crops published between 1996 and 2020. We examined the ability of user-oriented research to foster cumulative learning by examining four key aspects: spatial and temporal coverage; gender aspects; the range of traits considered and publishing practices as evident in reports and datasets. We conclude that user-oriented studies have received attention in RTB breeding but fall short of enabling cumulative learning. Substantial investments in methodology development and capacity are needed to bring greater coherence to this field and enable cumulative learning about user perspectives to iteratively increase the fit between improved genotypes and user preferences

Guidelines for mapping the preferences in gender sensitive product profiles to crop ontology and creating a consumer segment ontology. Version 1.0.

The guidelines were developed to guide scientists, database managers and ontology curators to annotate their product profiles with the ontology the proper social dimensions, documenting trait preferences in a way that it can be interpretable by breeders and food scientists. The development of breeding product profiles targeting specific market segments or consumer segments supposes that breeders can access interpretable information about the key preferences of the end users. The translation or interpretation of the collected preferences into traits and variables to make it interpretable and measurable by breeders is not always straightforward. A lot of contextual information needs to be included. The Guidelines were produced for the Research Programme on Roots, tubers and Bananas (RTB) and the RTBFoods project with the support of the CGIAR Gender Platform. Provided examples are taken from the RTB Foods-Alliance Bioversity CIAT report entitled ‘Gendered-food mapping on Matooke in Uganda: Understanding the Drivers of Trait Preferences and the ‘Development of Multi-user RTB Product Profiles’ (Marimo P. et al, 2021) and the RTBFoods ‘Gendered Food Product Profile Template’ (Forsythe et al, 2022), This version will go through further revisions following additional feedback provided by experts