Stated Preferences Outperform Elicited Preferences for Predicting Compliance with COVID-19 Prophylactic Measures

This paper studies the behavioral and socio-demographic determinants of compliance with prophylactic measures against COVID-19: barrier gestures, lockdown restrictions and mask wearing. The study contrasts two types of behavioral determinants: experimentally elicited preferences (risk tolerance, time preferences, social value orientation and cooperativeness) and stated preferences (risk tolerance, time preferences, and the GSS trust question). Data were collected from a representative sample of the French population (N=1154) surveyed during the first lockdown in May 2020, and the experimental tasks were carried out on-line. The in-sample and out-of-sample predictive power of several regression models - which vary in the set of variables that they include - are studied and compared. Overall, we find that stated preferences are better predictors of compliance with these prophylactic measures than preferences elicited through incentivized experiments: self-reported level of risk, patience and trust are predicting compliance