Conjoint Analysis for the Demand of Health Care related to Common Cold

Abstract

This article examines by means of Conjoint Analysis(CA)the health care choice available to Japanese people suffering from the common cold. CA is a stated preference technique that uses a survey and involves the hypothetical scenarios. Estimates obtained from CA might be biased because it is difficult to maintain the accuracy of the questionnaire under hypothetical scenarios. This article is the first attempt to evaluate the magnitude of the bias in CA, by comparison with actual behavior. Using information about people who actually have no health insurance, our empirical result shows that CA biases are around 12%.