Reference Points in Commuter Departure Time Choice: A Prospect Theoretic Test of Alternative Decision Frames

Prospect theoretic hypotheses about the value function are considered in the context of morning commutes. After a review of the formulations of utility functions in the past analyses of commuter departure time choice, this study adopts a formulation where the desirability of an arrival time at work is determined based on decision frames defined in terms of reference points. Probit models are applied to the data collected from randomly selected commuters of a bedroom community in the Kyoto-Osaka-Kobe metropolitan area of Japan, in order to estimate value functions empirically. Two alternative decision frames are compared based on the results of estimation and the empirical validity of the basic properties of the value function is examined.

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