Business Commons^™

A Randomized Trial Of Behavioral Nudges Delivered Through Text Messages To Increase Influenza Vaccination Among Patients With An Upcoming Primary Care Visit, Mitesh S. Patel, Katherin L. Milkman, Linnea Gandhi, Heather N. Graci, Dena Gromet, Brigitte C. Madrian

Faculty Publications

Purpose: To evaluate if nudges delivered by text message prior to an upcoming primary care visit can increase influenza vaccination rates.

Design: Randomized, controlled trial.

Setting: Two health systems in the Northeastern US between September 2020 and March 2021.

Subjects: 74,811 adults.

Interventions: Patients in the 19 intervention arms received 1-2 text messages in the 3 days preceding their appointment that varied in their format, interactivity, and content.

Measures: Influenza vaccination.

Analysis: Intention-to-treat.

Results: Participants had a mean (SD) age of 50.7 (16.2) years; 55.8% (41,771) were female, 70.6% (52,826) were White, and 19.0% (14,222) were Black. Among the interventions, …

Empirically Testing The Experience Type Framework, Mat Duerden, Camilla Hodge, Karen Melton, Peter Ward, Madison Bagley, Lexi Anderson, Tessa Meredith, Aubrey Rushton, Dennis Eggett, Andrew Lacanienta, Mark A. Widmer

Faculty Publications

In 2018, Duerden et al. proposed an experience type framework (ETF) which articulated key characteristics of ordinary and extraordinary experiences. While conceptually helpful, the framework has yet to be empirically tested. Thus, the purpose of this study was to empirically test the proposed hierarchical structure of the ETF. To achieve this purpose, we first developed, refined, and validated an operationalized ETF measurement tool, the experience type scale (ETS), to test the ETF. Data from three separate studies involving samples drawn from an online panel, participants in an executive Master of Business field study experience, and undergraduate students (n¼405) are analyzed …

Explaining Racial Disparities In Personal Bankruptcy Outcomes, Bronson Argyle, Sasha Indarte, Benjamin Iverson

Faculty Publications

We document substantial racial disparities in consumer bankruptcy outcomes and investigate the role of racial bias in contributing to these disparities. Using data on the near universe of US bankruptcy cases and deep-learning imputed measures of race, we show that Black filers are 21 and 3 percentage points (pp) more likely to have their bankruptcy cases dismissed without any debt relief in Chapters 13 and 7, respectively. We uncover strong evidence of racial homophily in Chapter 13: Black filers are 10 pp more likely to be dismissed when randomly assigned to a white bankruptcy trustee. To interpret our findings, we …

Fintech Lending With Lowtech Pricing, Mark J. Johnson, Itzhak Ben-David, Jason Lee, Vincent Yao

Faculty Publications

FinTech lending—known for using big data and advanced technologies—promised to break away from the traditional credit scoring and pricing models. Using a comprehensive dataset of FinTech personal loans, our study shows that loan rates continue to rely heavily on conventional credit scores, including 45% higher rates for nonprime borrowers. Other known default predictors are often neglected. Within each segment (prime/nonprime) loan rates are not very responsive to default risk, resulting in realized loan-level returns decreasing with risk. The pricing distortions result in substantial transfers from nonprime to prime borrowers and from low- to high-risk borrowers within segment.

Who Invests In Crypto? Wealth, Financial Constraints, And Risk Attitudes, Darren Aiello, Scott R. Baker, Tetyana Balyuk, Marco Di Maggio, Mark J. Johnson, Jason Kotter

Faculty Publications

We provide a first look into the drivers of household cryptocurrency investing. Analyzing consumer transaction data for millions of U.S. households, we find that, except for high income early adopters, cryptocurrency investors resemble the general population. These investors span all income levels, with most dollars coming from high-income individuals, similar to equity investors. High past crypto returns and personal income shocks lead to increased cryptocurrency investments. Higher household-level inflation expectations also correlate with greater crypto investments, aligning with hedging motives. For most U.S. households, cryptocurrencies are treated like traditional assets.

Measuring State And Trait Attention Control Using Mouse Movements, David W. Wilson, Jeffrey Jenkins, J. S. Valacich

Faculty Publications

Attention is a scarce resource in an increasingly distracting world. Although computing devices might well be blamed for much of the distraction we experience, these devices also afford an opportunity for feedback and improvement, as seen in a variety of contexts. This paper provides initial evidence that mouse movement data can be used to measure users’ attention control. Attention control refers to the ability to maintain top-down attention to goal-relevant stimuli and resist the distracting influence of irrelevant stimuli competing for attention. During a controlled experiment with conditions of varying levels of distraction, we captured participants’ mouse movements to determine …

The Critical Need For Human Capital Measurement Standards And Transparency In Healthcare, Heather Whiteman, Solange Charas, Hieu Bui, Lee S. Webster, James Gaskin

Faculty Publications

Despite long histories, the disciplines of healthcare performance analytics and human capital analytics followed parallel but separate tracks during the 19th and 20th centuries. Little has been done to integrate these two analytic disciplines to improve the delivery of medical care and the sustainability of healthcare organizations. Today, there is an increased demand for healthcare to meet the aging world population, spiraling healthcare costs, and a shortage of human resources to meet patient needs. It is imperative that healthcare professionals apply innovations to explore and optimize value from a combined discipline of healthcare human capital measurement and reporting.

Typing Fast Versus Typing Slow: Using Typing Dynamics To Reveal Authentic And Imposter Users, David Kim, Joseph S. Valacich, Jeffrey L. Jenkins, Manasvi Kumar

Faculty Publications

Real-time assessment of users' cognitive states has practical importance, allowing organizations to infer user behaviors. Realizing its importance, prior studies – specifically those using mouse cursor movements – have applied various theories to answer a similar question, i.e., how does a high cognitive load influence the users' device usage behavior? While numerous activities can increase cognitive load, we argue that the mechanisms behind how humans process information can more holistically be explained using Dual Process Theory (DPT) (i.e., when cognitive load is either low or high) and can be applied under a broad range of usage contexts. Using a within-participant …

Charting A Course To The Top: Insights From The Fortune 500 Cios And How They Differ From Other C-Suite Executives, Benjamin Richardson, Degan Kettles, Daniel Mazzola

Faculty Publications

No abstract provided.

An Angry Face And A Guilty Conscience: The Intrapersonal Effects Of Fake Anger In Negotiation, David Hunsaker, Teng Zhang, Mckenzie Rees

Faculty Publications

Research on anger in negotiation suggests that expressing anger can have detrimental effects on the relationship between the parties but may also improve the expresser’s economic outcomes, resulting in the use of fake anger (i.e., anger that is expressed but not felt) as a negotiation strategy. Based on research on moral emotions, we argue that fake anger in negotiation will lead to expressers’ guilt, which in turn negatively impacts their self-perception and their overall subjective experience of the negotiation. Across three studies (two online and one face-to-face), we consistently demonstrate that fake anger lowers negotiators’ feelings about themselves as well …

Blockchain In Supply Chain Management: A Feature-Function Framework For Future Research, James C. Brau, John Gardner, Hugo A. Decampos, Krista Gardner

Faculty Publications

Purpose – Blockchain technology offers numerous venues for supply chain applications and research. However, the connections between specific blockchain features and future applications have been unclear to date in its evolution. The purpose of this study is to fill this void.

Design/methodology/approach – The authors advance the understanding of blockchain in supply chain management by providing a new research framework built on unique blockchain features as applied across core supply chain functions.

Findings – This study’s framework is a feature-function matrix that integrates four overarching supply chain functions (i.e. supplier management, logistics, production processes and customer management) with nine blockchain …

Climate Change Risk Perception And Pro-Environmental Behavior: The Moderating Role Of Environmental Values And Psychological Contract Breach, Badar Latif, James Gaskin, Nuwan Gunarathne, Robert Sroufe, Arshian Sharif, Abdul Hanan

Faculty Publications

Purpose – Debates regarding climate change risk perception (CCRP), particularly its scale and impact on social and environmental sustainability, have continued for decades. CCRP is experiencing a renaissance with an increased focus on environmentally relevant behaviors to mitigate the effects of climate change. However, CCRP lacks investigation from the employee perspective. Supported by the social exchange and value–belief–norm theories, this study aims to address the impact of employees’ CCRP on their proenvironmental behavior (PEB) via the moderating roles of environmental values and psychological contract breach.

Design/methodology/approach – The nonprobability convenience sampling technique was used to collect survey data froma sample …

The Association Of Childhood Maltreatment With Internet Addiction: The Serial Mediating Effects Of Cognitive Emotion Regulation Strategies And Depression, Yuan-Yuan Guo, Jing-Jing Gu, James Gaskin, Xue-Qin Yin, Yu-Han Zhang, Jin-Liang Wang

Faculty Publications

Objectives: Childhood maltreatment, cognitive emotion regulation strategies (CERSs), and depression can be important in adolescents’ Internet addiction. The current study aims to investigate the direct effect of childhood maltreatment on Internet addiction and its indirect effects via CERSs and depression.

Participants and setting: 4091 adolescents (age M = 13.64, SD = 1.59; 48.9 % males) were recruited from a public school in China.

Methods: In a cross-sectional design, participants completed the Childhood Trauma Questionnaire-Short Form (CTQ-SF), the Cognitive Emotion Regulation Questionnaire-Short version (CERQ-Short), the Self-Rating Depression Scale (SDS), and the Internet Addiction Test (IAT). A latent structural equation model was …

How Certain Robot Attributes Influence Human-To-Robot Social And Emotional Bonds, James Gaskin, P. Thomas Fife, Warren Rosengren

Faculty Publications

A growing population of humans are feeling lonely and isolated and may therefore benefit from social and emotional companionship. However, other humans cannot always be available to fulfill these needs, and such in-need individuals often cannot care for pets. Therefore, we explore how robot companions may be designed to facilitate bonds with humans. Our preliminary examination of 115 participants in a scenario based quasi-experimental study suggests that humans are more likely to develop social and emotional bonds with robots when those robots are good at communicating and conveying emotions. However, robots’ anthropomorphic attributes and responsiveness to external cues were found …

Land Prices And The Development Process, Henry J. Munneke, C. F. Sirmans, Barrett Slade

Faculty Publications

As lot area increases, it is commonly believed that land prices will increase at a nonconstant rate. In the case where the land price-area curve increases at a decreasing rate with respect to parcel area, it is believed the cost of subdividing land is the driving factor behind the concavity. This paper uses a unique data set to explore how the area elasticity of price changes over the development cycle as land moves from raw land to finished lots. The results show the area elasticity of price increases as parcels of land move through the phases of development. The results …

Automatic Enrollment With A 12 Percent Default Contribution Rate, Josh Beshears, Ruofei Guo, David Laibson, Brigitte C. Madrian, James J. Choi

Faculty Publications

We study a retirement savings plan with a default contribution rate of 12 percent of income, which is much higher than previously studied defaults. Twenty-five percent of employees had not opted out of this default 12 months after hire; a literature review finds that the corresponding fraction in plans with lower defaults is approximately one-half. Because only contributions above 12 percent were matched by the employer, 12 percent was likely to be a suboptimal contribution rate for employees. Employees who remained at the 12 percent default contribution rate had average income that was approximately one-third lower than would be predicted …

The Effects Of Cryptocurrency Wealth On Household Consumption And Investment, Darren Aiello, Scott R. Baker, Tetyana Balyuk, Marco Di Maggio, Mark Johnson, Jason Kotter, Emily Williams

Faculty Publications

Key Results:

• Retail crypto investors hold crypto as one part of a broader portfolio
• Inflation expectations drive crypto investment
• Marginal propensity to consume (MPC) out of crypto wealth is big!
• Households use crypto wealth to purchase housing
• As a result, crypto wealth shocks spill over into local house prices

Human Or Ai? Using Digital Behavior To Verify Essay Authorship, David W. Wilson, Parker Burnett, Joseph S. Valacich, Jeffrey L. Jenkins

Faculty Publications

Large language models (LLMs) such as OpenAI's GPT-4 have transformed natural language processing with their ability to understand context and generate human-like text. This has led to considerable debate, especially in the education sector, where LLMs can enhance learning but also pose challenges to academic integrity. Detecting AIgenerated content (AIGC) is difficult, as existing methods struggle to keep pace with advancements in generation technology. This research proposes a novel approach to AIGC detection in short essays, using digital behavior capture and follow-up questioning to verify text authorship. We executed a controlled experiment as an initial evaluation to test the prototype …

Auditing With Data And Analytics: External Reviewers’ Judgments Of Audit Quality And Effort, Scott A. Emett, Steven E. Kaplan, Elaine G. Mauldin, Jeffrey Pickerd

Faculty Publications

Audit firms hesitate to take full advantage of data and analytics (D&A) audit approaches because they lack certainty about how external reviewers evaluate those approaches. We propose that external reviewers use an effort heuristic when evaluating audit quality, judging less effortful audit procedures as lower quality, which could shape how external reviewers evaluate D&A audit procedures. We conduct two experiments in which experienced external reviewers evaluate one set of audit procedures (D&A or traditional) within an engagement review, while holding constant the procedures’ level of assurance. Our first experiment provides evidence that external reviewers rely on an effort heuristic when …

The Icfr Process: Perspectives Of Accounting Executives At Large Public Companies, Eldar Maksymov, Jeffrey Pickerd, T. Jeffrey Wilks, Devin Williams

Faculty Publications

The Sarbanes-Oxley Act charges management with the primary responsibility for internal control over financial reporting (ICFR). However, prior research tells us little about the ICFR process from management’s perspective. We develop a theoretical model of the ICFR process from management’s perspective and examine that model by surveying 145 and interviewing 35 accounting executives at large US public companies. Our primary finding is that executives feel constrained in their ability to direct ICFR and hold perspectives that reflect these constraints. Specifically, most executives feel compelled by auditors to follow the PCAOB’s preferences even though executives believe these preferences often tend to …

Corporate Political Activism And Information Transfers, Dane M. Christensen, Hengda Jin, Joshua A. Lee, Suhas A. Sridharan, Laura A. Wellman

Faculty Publications

Prior research suggests that: (1) politically active firms have an information advantage over firms that do not engage in the political process, but also that (2) politically active firms are more likely to disclose policy-related information. We examine whether there are externalities associated with the processing of political information by politically active firms. We study this question in the setting of intra-industry information transfers around earnings announcements. Measuring firms’ political activism using campaign contributions, we find stronger intra-industry information transfers from politically active firms to their industry peers. These information transfers are stronger when there is more discussion during conference …

Ethnic Minority Analysts’ Participation In Public Earnings Conference Calls, Rachel W. Flam, Jeremiah Green, Joshua A. Lee, Nathan Y. Sharp

Faculty Publications

We investigate ethnic minority and non-minority sell-side analysts’ participation in public earnings conference calls. We find that minority analysts are underrepresented in conference call Q&A sessions, and minority analysts who do participate on the calls experience lower levels of prioritization than do nonminority analysts. Minority analysts’ lower participation rates are partially but not fully mediated by characteristics such as experience, work environment, and stock rating favorability. Additionally, firm and conference call fixed effects mediate approximately half the magnitude of lower minority participation rates. Extroverted minority analysts participate at higher rates, but the negative association between minority status and conference call …

Innovations In Ipo Deal Structure: Do Up-C Ipos Harm Public Shareholders?, Mary Brooke Billings, Kevin Hsueh, Melissa F. Lewis-Western, Gladriel Shobe

Faculty Publications

This paper examines an innovation in capital formation that has spurred contentious debate: the Umbrella Partnership Corporation (“Up-C”) IPO. Advisors and underwriters argue that the Up-C deal structure is a driver of post-IPO value and, thus, is a value-enhancing means of raising capital that may be one solution to concerns regarding the drop in the number of publicly traded companies. Consistent with these claims, recent research suggests that organizing soon-to-be public businesses as pass-through entities (as is the case for Up-Cs) leads to superior future performance. Yet, broadening the analysis to consider abnormal stock performance and post-IPO litigation of a …

The Spillover Effect Of Sec Comment Letters Through Audit Firms, Kenneth L. Bills, Ryan Cating, Chenxi Lin, Timothy Seidel

Faculty Publications

This study examines whether auditors serve as a conduit for disseminating Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) views on reporting and disclosure matters as the result of being privy to clients’ SEC comment letters. This examination is important because auditors’ involvement in, and private access to, clients’ comment letters can enhance the timeliness of dissemination and have a constraining influence on reporting or disclosure choices that diverge from SEC views. Among clients with a greater expectation of impaired goodwill that do not receive a comment letter with a goodwill-related comment, we find a greater likelihood of goodwill impairment when the audit …

Balancing Loyalties: A Behavioral Study On How The Quality Of Supervisor-Subordinate Relationships Affects Whistleblowing Intentions, Jace B. Garrett, Douglas F. Prawitt, Kyle Sopp

Faculty Publications

While high-quality relationships among employees yield many benefits to organizations, they may have unintended consequences for whistleblowing. In a first experiment, we investigate whether high-quality employee-supervisor relationships reduce employees’ willingness to report supervisor wrongdoing through an internal hotline. We also investigate whether the quality of such relationships mitigates the effect of evidence strength on reporting intention. In a second experiment, we test the robustness of the effects of relationship quality and evidence strength on employees’ willingness to report wrongdoing identified in our first experiment, but to an external auditor. We also examine two factors that may mitigate the negative effect …

Current Issues Faced By Controllers, Anthony C. Bucaro, T. Jeffrey Wilks, Christopher Yust

Faculty Publications

We conduct a series of semi-structured interviews with controllers and chief accounting officers from large public and private companies—over half are Fortune 500—to identify the current issues faced by the controllership function. We map these issues into the Institute of Management Accountants (IMA®) Management Accounting Competencies and highlight recent research that addresses these issues and where there are gaps. Our findings suggest three IMA competencies that weigh heavily on controllers’ minds: (1) collaboration, teamwork, and relationship management; (2) information systems and technology; and (3) talent management. Finally, we describe how the insights from controllers suggest important improvements to accounting curriculum …

Human Connection: A Crucial Ingredient In Vacation Experience, Ondrej Mitas, Moji Shahvali, Peter Ward, Mat Duerden, Marcel Bastiaansen

Faculty Publications

The past decade (2012–2022) has seen a blossoming of research on tourists’ quality of life. Frameworks such as subjective well-being (Diener & Seligman, 2002), the PERMA wellbeing theory (Seligman, 2012) and eudaimonia (Filep & Deery, 2010) have been used to document the numerous positive psychological effects of tourist experiences. One of the most robust findings from this literature is that engaging in tourism triggers emotions. Ranging from the excitement of hobby-focused competitions and tours (Mitas et al., 2012a) to the relaxation of a spa (Strauss-Blasche et al., 2004a), dozens of studies have now documented salubrious emotional profiles over the course …

The Impact Of Reflection On Experience Type Perceptions, Mat D. Duerden, Camilla Hodge, Karen Melton, Aubrey Rushton, Lexi Anderson, Madison Bagley

Faculty Publications

Whether an experience is perceived as ordinary or extraordinary (i.e., memorable, meaningful, transformational) (Duerden et al., 2018) depends on a variety of potential factors including but not limited to time, social connection, and reflection. The purpose of this experimental study was to assess how activity type, social connection, and reflection type influences exper ience type, ordinary versus extraordinary, perceptions overtime. Data was collected from 209 undergraduates using a 4x4 experimental design. Participants engaged in one of four different 20-minute activities based upon Melton's (2017) family activity model (e.g., core:parallel, core:joint, balance:parallel, and balance:joint). Each activity was run for four different …

Category Versus Labeled Magnitude Scale Measures Of Immediate Conscious Leisure Experiences: Engagement, Immersion, And Absorption, Gary D. Ellis, Patti A. Freeman, Brian J. Hill, Jingxian Jiang

Faculty Publications

We developed and validated single-item category (CAT) and labeled magnitude (LM) scales of three recalled immediate conscious leisure experiences: engagement, immersion, and absorption. These minimally invasive scales are suitable for use in experiments, surveys, and evaluations in the travel and leisure industries. The CAT scales followed a familiar Likert-type format, while the LM scales involved calibration by 169 judges using two modalities (drawing lines of differing lengths and providing numeric magnitude judgments) to establish empirically determined ratio-scaled distances among seven modifiers (not at all, slightly, somewhat, quite, very, greatly, and extremely). We collected 3,821 experience observations from 621 visitors to …

Does Audit Regulation Improve The Underlying Information Used By Managers? Evidence From Pcaob Inspection Access And Management Forecast Accuracy, Brant E. Christensen, Lijun (Gillian) Lei, Sydney Qing Shu, Wayne Thomas

Faculty Publications

Survey evidence and academic research raise the possibility that audit regulation can impact not only the information contained in external financial reports but also the internal information used by management. We investigate this possibility by examining the improvement in management forecast accuracy around initiation of the Public Company Accounting Oversight Board's (PCAOB) international inspection program. Consistent with managers having improved information, we find that managers issue more accurate forecasts following PCAOB inspection access. Multiple additional analyses support that an improved information environment is the mechanism underlying our results, and this effect is distinct from, and incremental to, any effects of …