We test whether an environment of poverty affects time preferences through purely psychological channels. We measured discount rates among farmers in Uganda who made decisions about when to enjoy entertainment instead of working. To circumvent the role of economic constraints, we experimentally induced thoughts about poverty-related problems, using priming techniques. We find that thinking about poverty increases the preference to consume entertainment early and to delay work. Using monitoring tools similar to eye tracking, a novel feature for this subject pool, we show that this effect is unlikely to be driven by less careful decision-making processes.

中文翻译：

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贫困对时间偏好的心理影响

我们测试贫困环境是否会通过纯粹的心理渠道影响时间偏好。我们测量了乌干达农民的折扣率，他们决定何时享受娱乐而不是工作。为了规避经济约束的作用，我们使用启动技术实验性地引发了对贫困相关问题的思考。我们发现，考虑贫困会增加提早消费娱乐和推迟工作的偏好。使用类似于眼动追踪的监控工具，这是该主题池的一个新功能，我们表明这种效果不太可能是由不太谨慎的决策过程驱动的。