The impact of information, value-deliberation and group-based decision-making on values for ecosystem services: Integrating deliberative monetary valuation and storytelling

Monetary valuation quantifies exchange values, but broader approaches are needed to understand the meaning of those monetary values and the shared, plural and cultural values that underpin them. In this study, we integrated deliberative monetary valuation, storytelling, subjective well-being and psychometric approaches to comprehensively elicit cultural ecosystem service values for proposed UK marine protected areas. We elicit and compare five valuation stages: individual values from an online survey; individual and group values following deliberation on information in workshops; and individual and group values following storytelling and a ‘transcendental values compass’ deliberation. Deliberated group values significantly differed from non-deliberated individual values, with reduced willingness to pay and increased convergence with subjective wellbeing; deliberated individual values fell between the two. Storytelling played an important role in revealing values that were previously implicit. Participants were more confident about values elicited in the workshops than the online survey and felt that deliberated values should be used in decision-making. The results of this study (albeit with a limited sample size) suggest that shared values may be a better reflection of welfare implications than non-deliberated individual values, while at the same time more reflective of participants' transcendental values: their broader life goals and principles.