What would people personally do to help Latvia?

PEPS-Y Wave 2 · Baltic crisis experiment

We asked 6,388 people across seven countries what they would personally do if Latvia were attacked. They could select any of four actions, from paying an additional monthly tax to enlisting in the armed forces.

Did people follow the proposed order?

The proposed sequence was pay an extra monthly tax → do civilian work → host refugees → enlist. Under this sequence, someone who chooses to host refugees would also choose the tax and civilian work. People may see the costs differently. For example, someone may be able to offer their time even if they cannot afford an extra tax.

56.6% of all respondents and 39.1% of those who chose an action followed the proposed order.

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The first bar includes everyone who chose no action, which fits the proposed order at level zero. The second bar shows how often people followed it when they offered to help.

What did people skip?

322 of the 641 people willing to enlist skipped the tax. Civilian work alone was the most common departure from the proposed order (1,236 people). Just 199 selected all four actions.

Six bars show how often respondents chose a higher-ranked action while skipping a lower-ranked one. About half of respondents willing to enlist skipped the tax.

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Putting civilian work before the tax gave the best fit of all 24 possible orders. Even then, about one third of respondents skipped a step. Each bar uses the people who chose the first action as its denominator. The same person can appear in several bars.

Who reached higher levels of personal sacrifice?

Among 3,146 respondents who followed the proposed order and had complete background data, giving 25 more points in the Wave 1 Solidarity Game was associated with 14% higher odds of reaching a higher level of personal sacrifice in Wave 2. More educated and higher-income respondents, older respondents, and men also tended to reach higher levels.

People who gave more in Wave 1, older people, and people with higher education or income had higher estimated odds of reaching a higher level. Women had lower estimated odds than men.

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Each dot shows an estimated comparison after accounting for the other factors. For example, 2× means twice the odds of reaching a higher level. Dots to the right of 1× indicate higher odds. Dots to the left indicate lower odds. The horizontal lines show 95% confidence intervals, which indicate how uncertain each estimate is. The link with earlier giving, and the differences by gender and education, also appeared when we included people who skipped steps.

Did a larger attack change what people chose?

People shown the larger attack tended to select a higher-ranked action when everyone was included and each person was scored by their highest choice. The estimate was less clear when we counted the number of actions, or looked only at people who followed the order.

The highest-ranked action comparison is 1.15 and its interval stays above 1. The intervals for the number of actions and for people who followed the order cross 1.

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For example, someone who selects enlistment alone scores 4 on highest-ranked action and 1 on number of actions. The full-sample comparisons use the randomly assigned attack descriptions. The comparison among people who followed the order uses a group defined by their answers after assignment. Treat the highest-action result as exploratory.

Technical details

Response counts, weighting and model results

The charts about response patterns show unweighted sample shares. The models use longitudinal weights and account for clustering by NUTS2 region. They adjust for country and randomized survey-block order. Age, gender and education come from Wave 1. Higher household income means a reported Wave 2 income bracket above the median bracket in the respondent’s country.

There were 3617 cumulative response patterns in the sample. The adjusted difference in the share who followed the order between the larger and smaller attack groups was -2.9 percentage points (95% CI -6.7 to 1.0). The people who followed the order can still differ between groups.

All 16 response patterns

Actions Respondents Sample share Weighted share Follows order
None 1841 28.8% 31.1% Yes
Civilian work 1236 19.3% 18.8% No
Additional tax 617 9.7% 8.9% Yes
Host refugees 555 8.7% 9.1% No
Additional tax, Civilian work 481 7.5% 7.4% Yes
Additional tax, Civilian work, Host refugees 479 7.5% 7.0% Yes
Civilian work, Host refugees 361 5.7% 5.2% No
Additional tax, Civilian work, Host refugees, Enlist 199 3.1% 2.9% Yes
Enlist 188 2.9% 2.8% No
Additional tax, Host refugees 177 2.8% 2.6% No
Additional tax, Civilian work, Enlist 82 1.3% 1.3% No
Civilian work, Enlist 74 1.2% 1.2% No
Civilian work, Host refugees, Enlist 44 0.7% 0.8% No
Additional tax, Enlist 23 0.4% 0.4% No
Host refugees, Enlist 16 0.3% 0.2% No
Additional tax, Host refugees, Enlist 15 0.2% 0.2% No

Model estimates

The ordinal model estimates a common odds ratio across four thresholds. The threshold-specific estimates below show how the comparisons vary when each threshold is modeled separately.

Model Predictor N Odds ratio 95% lower 95% upper p
Cumulative intensity Large vs small attack 3146 1.082 0.898 1.304 0.403662
Cumulative intensity 25 more Solidarity Game points 3146 1.144 1.056 1.239 0.001147
Cumulative intensity Women vs men 3146 0.466 0.378 0.575 < 1e-04
Cumulative intensity 10 years older 3146 1.158 1.090 1.230 < 1e-04
Cumulative intensity Medium vs low education 3146 1.504 1.143 1.979 0.003849
Cumulative intensity High vs low education 3146 3.241 2.447 4.292 < 1e-04
Cumulative intensity Higher vs lower household income 3146 1.746 1.379 2.211 < 1e-04
Cumulative intensity, all qualifying Large vs small attack 3617 1.100 0.925 1.307 0.278614
Highest action selected Large vs small attack 5593 1.114 0.970 1.279 0.126542
Highest action selected 25 more Solidarity Game points 5593 1.124 1.061 1.191 < 1e-04
Highest action selected Women vs men 5593 0.606 0.523 0.703 < 1e-04
Highest action selected 10 years older 5593 1.037 0.996 1.081 0.080562
Highest action selected Medium vs low education 5593 1.339 1.074 1.669 0.009835
Highest action selected High vs low education 5593 2.062 1.634 2.602 < 1e-04
Highest action selected Higher vs lower household income 5593 1.134 0.980 1.311 0.090983
Number of actions selected Large vs small attack 5593 1.029 0.891 1.187 0.697672
Number of actions selected 25 more Solidarity Game points 5593 1.119 1.058 1.184 0.000121
Number of actions selected Women vs men 5593 0.590 0.503 0.692 < 1e-04
Number of actions selected 10 years older 5593 1.066 1.021 1.113 0.004198
Number of actions selected Medium vs low education 5593 1.395 1.123 1.734 0.002934
Number of actions selected High vs low education 5593 2.636 2.098 3.311 < 1e-04
Number of actions selected Higher vs lower household income 5593 1.384 1.155 1.658 0.000530
Highest action, all valid responses Large vs small attack 6388 1.146 1.017 1.290 0.025259
Number of actions, all valid responses Large vs small attack 6388 1.059 0.936 1.198 0.362981
Threshold-specific odds ratios for each predictor and the four personal-sacrifice thresholds.

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