Visual continuous time preferences: field experiment in Honduras

Abstract

Visual Continuous Time Preferences (VCTP) is a new tool for measuring time preferences that synthesizes the simplicity of Multiple Price List (MPL) and the precision of Convex Time Budget (CTB) tasks. We evaluate this tool in the field, in rural Honduras, to test whether running the task with enumerators and reducing the number of balls to five improves the quality of results. We partially replicate results of the laboratory experiment since subjects answer the task rapidly and consistently to reveal their time preferences, but they make little use of the additional precision. Enumerators are crucial for maintaining sample size and reducing the number of balls is not an improvement because it decreases the precision of answers. Results therefore suggest the power of the visual methodology to measure economic preferences with populations struggling with complexity by making accessible the salient aspects of the reasoning.