Who's Afraid of Cryptoization?

Abstract

This study examines attitudes towards the economic and political outcomes of widespread cryptocurrency adoption in a survey experiment conducted in Finland. Its goal is to assess how information on the political implications of cryptocurrencies influences individuals' investment tendencies and their views on regulation and technology abolishment. Utilizing a survey experiment design for causal inference, it explores reactions to the perceived economic, monetary, fiscal, and geopolitical impacts of wider cryptocurrency adoption. Although priming messages had no significant effect on opinions about government intervention in crypto markets, a slight influence on personal investment decisions was noted, with some participants showing increased reluctance to invest due to potential economic and political repercussions. While our findings are not claimed to be universal, we aim to inspire further scholarly engagement with the topic of crypto adoption, a process currently influenced by negotiations between powerful interest groups and regulators. We argue for the importance of considering public attitudes and interests in these discussions. A pre-analysis plan was uploaded and registered on the Open Science Framework (osf.io) on