Scholars@Duke
Yichun Fan

Yichun Fan

Assistant Professor of Climate Economics in Environmental Social Systems
Environmental Social Systems
yichun.fan@duke.edu
4101 Grainger Hall, Durham, NC 27710
4101 Grainger Hall, Durham, NC 27710

Selected Publications

Unequal impacts of rising temperatures on global human sentiment

Journal Article One Earth · October 17, 2025 Climate change poses growing risks to human well-being, yet research on its emotional impact has primarily focused on developed nations, obscuring potential global inequalities in psychological vulnerability. Here, we analyze over 1.2 billion social media ... Full text Cite

Social cost of lifestyle adaptation: Air pollution and outdoor physical exercise

Journal Article Journal of Environmental Economics and Management · September 1, 2024 The social cost of environmental hazards depends on the well-being impacts of both exposure and adaptation. While the monetary expenditure of adaptation is increasingly considered, little research assesses the social cost associated with non-market lifesty ... Full text Cite

Intraday adaptation to extreme temperatures in outdoor activity.

Journal Article Scientific reports · January 2023 Linkages between climate and human activity are often calibrated at daily or monthly resolutions, which lacks the granularity to observe intraday adaptation behaviors. Ignoring this adaptation margin could mischaracterize the health consequences of future ... Full text Cite

Effect of carbon market on air pollution: Firm-level evidence in China

Journal Article Resources Conservation and Recycling · July 1, 2022 Ancillary impacts of climate policies on issues other than climate consequences are important for the cost-benefit analysis of optimal policy design, policy-making process, and climate communications. A common perception, relying on scenarios and simulatio ... Full text Cite

Global evidence of expressed sentiment alterations during the COVID-19 pandemic.

Journal Article Nature human behaviour · March 2022 The COVID-19 pandemic has created unprecedented burdens on people's physical health and subjective well-being. While countries worldwide have developed platforms to track the evolution of COVID-19 infections and deaths, frequent global measurements of affe ... Full text Cite

Encouraging the resumption of economic activity after COVID-19: Evidence from a large scale-field experiment in China.

Journal Article Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America · February 2022 As the COVID-19 pandemic comes to an end, governments find themselves facing a new challenge: motivating citizens to resume economic activity. What is an effective way to do so? We investigate this question using a field experiment in the city of Zhengzhou ... Full text Cite

Measuring daily-life fear perception change: A computational study in the context of COVID-19.

Journal Article PloS one · January 2022 COVID-19, as a global health crisis, has triggered the fear emotion with unprecedented intensity. Besides the fear of getting infected, the outbreak of COVID-19 also created significant disruptions in people's daily life and thus evoked intensive psycholog ... Full text Cite

Street pedestrianization in urban districts: Economic impacts in Spanish cities

Journal Article Cities · January 1, 2022 This study analyzes the influence of pedestrianization of urban space on the revenues of surrounding retail stores. Pedestrianization refers to the conversion of street use from vehicles to a walkable environment. We compiled a unique transaction dataset c ... Full text Cite

The impact of social externality information on fostering sustainable travel mode choice: A behavioral experiment in Zhengzhou, China

Journal Article Transportation Research Part A Policy and Practice · October 1, 2021 Urban leaders in areas with high air pollution often face the dual task of reducing pollution levels while educating the public about the health impacts of pollution and preventive measures. Transportation policies to cut motorized personal vehicle use are ... Full text Cite

Health perception and commuting choice: A survey experiment measuring behavioral trade-offs between physical activity benefits and pollution exposure risks

Journal Article Environmental Research Letters · May 1, 2021 Previous literature suggests that active commuting has substantial health benefits. Yet, in polluted regions, it can also cause additional health risks by increasing riders' pollution exposure and raising their inhalation rate. We examine the effect of per ... Full text Cite

Dockless bike sharing alleviates road congestion by complementing subway travel: Evidence from Beijing

Journal Article Cities · December 1, 2020 Dockless bike sharing provides a flexible transportation alternative, enriching the potential of both a feeder mode for subway access and a direct substitute for subway trips. This research evaluates the interaction between dockless shared bikes and Beijin ... Full text Cite

Low-carbon innovation induced by emissions trading in China.

Journal Article Nature communications · September 2019 Emissions trading scheme (ETS) has been adopted by an increasing number of countries and regions for carbon mitigation, but its actual effect depends on specific program design and institutional context. Before launching the world largest ETS, China experi ... Full text Cite