ABSTRACT
Having described the relationship between the contingent valuation method and other methods of measuring the benefits of nonmarketed goods, we now turn to three key issues in the design of contingent valuation scenarios that are the subject of current debate among CV researchers. Each involves design choices the researcher must make that may have a large effect on the quality of a CV study's findings and their appropriateness for use by policy makers. The first is whether a CV study should be based on a private goods market or a political market. The second issue concerns which of the several techniques for eliciting the WTP amount from the respondent is most appropriate for the study, and how the chosen technique should be implemented. These two issues are discussed in this chapter. The third set of choices involves how much and what kind of information about the amenity and the hypothetical market the researcher should include in the material presented to the respondent during the course of the interview. These decisions involve tradeoffs on the researcher's part between the need to inform the respondent about relevant features of the hypothetical market and the need to avoid information overload, and between the desire to measure benefits in a manner that offers policymakers the utmost flexibility in using the findings and the difficulty respondents have with scenarios that are too abstract (in the sense that they lack concrete details about the amenity and the conditions under which it would be provided). Discussion of the information issue begins in this chapter and continues throughout the book.
