Can immersive virtual reality increase respondents’ certainty in discrete choice experiments? A comparison with traditional presentation formats

Stated preference methods such as discrete choice experiments (DCEs) are used to elicit respondents' preferences and willingness to pay (WTP) for environmental goods or services whose value cannot be observed in actual markets. However, DCEs may deliver biased estimates because of respondents' unfamiliarity with the hypothetical scenarios to be valued. There is evidence that visualization techniques can enhance respondents' cognitive ability and improve the evaluation and interpretation of complex information. We leverage recent technological advances to create an immersive virtual reality environment delivered to respondents via a head-mounted display in order to conduct a split split-sample experiment on the value of urban greenery (i.e., trees, bio-retention planters) using three different presentation formats (text only; video; virtual reality). We find that (i) respondent certainty can be increased by employing more immersive visualization techniques such as virtual reality, and that (ii) the presentation format has a significant impact on WTP estimates for different types of urban green and can change respondents’ rank order for the urban green options considered in the study.