Behavioral Economics Commons^™

The Influence Of Framing And Recent Experience On Farmer Choices In Experimental Games Depicting Risk-Reducing Agricultural Technologies, Ana Maria Ospina Tobar

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

Climate change is a major threat to food security, particularly in low and middle-income countries that are highly dependent on staple crops for subsistence. The vulnerability of staple crops, like maize, in the face of climate change, is increasing due to the increasing frequency of droughts. This thesis aims to evaluate two mechanisms through which farmers may be more willing to adopt new technologies that increase their resilience to climate change: First, I evaluate the effectiveness of a new virtual maize farming game as a learning tool to teach farmers about the outcomes they could obtain under different weather events …

The Effects Of Personality And Risk Preferences On Effort-Based Behavior: A Game Theoretic Approach, Hannah M. Davidsen

Honors Theses

Our personality and preferences play a major role in the decisions we make in our everyday lives. Drawing from literature exploring how people innovate under different scenarios (Dubina, 2013), the present study expanded this topic to include any scenario where there is incentive to free-ride off of another’s effort. I designed a study in which participants (N=73) were asked to complete the Big 5 personality questionnaire, a cognitive reflection task, an altruism elicitation task, and a risk elicitation task, then were randomly paired with another participant to complete four different rounds of a public goods game. Each round of the …

Three Essays In Experimental And Network Economics, John D. Mcmahan

Doctoral Dissertations

This dissertation consists of the three essays in network and experimental economics. The first essay explores the importance of endogenous bilateral connections and punishment networks in public good settings. I conduct a laboratory experiment that varies the incentive to form links among participants in a traditional Voluntary Contribution Mechanism game. I find that when link benefits are zero very few connections are formed, and very little punishment takes place. When link benefits are positive many links are formed and cooperation levels are increased. In general, we find evidence that participants strategically use the bilateral linking process to avoid punishment and …

The Impact Of Mindfulness On Healthy Food Choices, Kaylea Hopfer

Graduate Theses and Dissertations

The practice of mindfulness has a long history in research, particularly psychological studies. In this paper I examine the effects of a short mindfulness intervention on healthy food purchases. Specifically, I developed an online survey and recruited 634 participants via Prolific between July 24 - July 27, 2020. I randomly assigned participants to either a mindfulness manipulation or a control condition. Following treatment (or control) participants completed a food choice task and various other control. Following the survey, I analyzed data using R version 4.0.2 (2020-06-22) and R-Studio. I estimated three different regression models, ordinary least squares (OLS), Poisson, and …

Adaptive Utility: Observing The Rate Of Adaptation In Happiness As Short Run Shifts Revert To Long Run Averages, Cameron Bellamoroso

Honors Thesis

In economics, human decision-making models are based on the utility, or happiness, a person experiences from the choices they make. Individual happiness is closely tied to societal and global well-being, a common political and and research goal. Psychological studies on happiness show that people generally return to an average level of happiness after experiencing a significant positive or negative change in their life, a process known as the ``hedonic treadmill.'' Empirically, it is often difficult for people to predict the specific utility they will experience from a given choice, leading them to maintain constant preferences for only frequently experienced options. …

Actual Versus Hypothetical Wta Stated Values For Recreational Fishing Licenses: Experimental Evidence Of Fish Tales, Scott Steinback, Kristy Wallmo, Sabrina Lovell, Eric Thunberg, John Foster

Journal of Ocean and Coastal Economics

We compared hypothetical willingness to accept (WTA) values for Massachusetts saltwater recreational fishing licenses with WTA values obtained in an actual (simulated) marketplace. Using a dichotomous choice contingent valuation approach, our results align with past evidence that found WTA values elicited from hypothetical transactions overstate those derived from an actual marketplace. We also provide the first evidence about the effectiveness of an ex-post certainty adjustment technique in a WTA environment. While the adjustment technique has been found to eliminate hypothetical bias in willingness to pay (WTP) settings, we find that when applied in a WTA setting, the approach mitigates but …

Does Poverty Really Impede Cognitive Function? Experimental Evidence From Tanzanian Fishers, Virginia Graves

Master's Theses

Does the feeling of scarcity really impede cognitive function? Using experimental evidence from Tanzanian fishers, this study examines the connection between poverty and cognitive function. Fishers in the experiment are tested on how exposure to a ‘scarcity trigger’ impacts cognition and productivity through measuring performance on problem solving tasks. The study also creates an index of distractions to test how existing problems in an individual’s life, which contribute to limited attention, relates to cognitive function and productivity. Experimental results do not find that mental and financial scarcities significantly impact test performance. Although the study finds no significant causal evidence, this …

Essays In Pro-Social Behavior, Joshua R. Foster

Graduate Theses and Dissertations

This dissertation examines individuals' actions to improve social outcomes when unrecoverable investments are necessary. Situations involving non-pecuniary and pecuniary investments are considered. In the former, the prerequisite of real effort - a non-pecuniary, unrecoverable investment - is examined when said effort determines an individual's ability to procure their preferred social outcome. Theoretical predictions over an individual's effort provision are based on their revealed preferences for the social distribution of wealth according to the general axiom of revealed preference (GARP). Laboratory experiments reveal that individuals' effort provisions do not support the assumption of stable preferences (transitivity) of wealth distribution. Specifically, individuals …

Why Risk It? The Effect Of Risk And Time Preferences On Microfinance Loan Default, Nike Start

Nike Start

Microfinance is widely recognized as a powerful method for poverty alleviation. However, little is known about the characteristics of those who default on their loans. Understanding the behavior of borrowers is an important component of mitigating adverse selection and the moral hazard of lending. Both of these concepts embody some of the greatest challenges faced by microfinance institutions, and they provide the major motivation for this study. Accordingly, the main objective of this research is to investigate whether non-delinquent borrowers and delinquent borrowers of a microfinance institution reveal any difference in their level of risk preference and time preference. This …

Why Risk It? The Effect Of Risk And Time Preferences On Microfinance Loan Default, Nike Start

Master's Theses

Microfinance is widely recognized as a powerful method for poverty

alleviation. However, little is known about the characteristics of those who

default on their loans. Understanding the behavior of borrowers is an important

component of mitigating adverse selection and the moral hazard of lending. Both

of these concepts embody some of the greatest challenges faced by microfinance

institutions, and they provide the major motivation for this study. Accordingly,

the main objective of this research is to investigate whether non-delinquent

borrowers and delinquent borrowers of a microfinance institution reveal any

difference in their level of risk preference and time preference. This …

First Price Auctions, Lotteries, And Risk Preferences Across Institutions, Russell P. Engel

WCBT Faculty Publications

There is an unsettled debate in experimental economics literature regarding the consistency of individuals' risk preferences in varying institutions. Much of this debate stems from observations of subjects' bids in sealed-bid auctions and the implications of those bids. In this paper, I have subjects participate in a sealed-bid auction experiment and then examine if the ostensible risk parameter that one can back out from subjects' bids matches up with their elicited risk preference from a separate task in the experiment. I find that subjects do exhibit consistent risk preferences. The aggregate measure of the subjects' risk parameter is stable across …

Inequality, Communication And The Avoidance Of Disastrous Climate Change In A Public Goods Game, Alessandro Tavoni, Astrid Dannenberg, Giorgos Kallis, Andreas Loeschel

Alessandro Tavoni

International efforts to provide global public goods often face the challenges of coordinating national contributions and distributing costs equitably in the face of uncertainty, inequality, and free-riding incentives. In an experimental setting, we distribute endowments unequally among a group of people who can reach a fixed target sum through successive money contributions, knowing that if they fail they will lose all their remaining money with 50% probability. In some treatments we give players the option to communicate intended contributions. We find that inequality reduces the prospects of reaching the target, but that communication increases success dramatically. Successful groups tend to …

Taking, Giving And Taking To Give: Experimental Evidence Of Preferences Over Actions, Andrew Hayashi

Andrew Hayashi

The desirability of an outcome often depends on the action that must be taken to bring it about. Using a within-subject design that permits the identification of individual preferences, I report experimental evidence from disinterested dictator games suggesting that preferences over income distributions depend on whether implementing those distributions requires the allocation of gains, the imposition of losses or the redistribution of pre-existing endowments. Subjects exhibit a stronger preference for equality when the action required to implement it involves the unequal allocation of income or redistribution of wealth than when it requires the unequal imposition of losses, an effect that …

Charitable Memberships, Volunteering, And Discounts: Evidence From A Large-Scale Online Field Experiment, Andreas Lange, Andrew J. Stocking

Andrew J Stocking

Despite the increasing use by charities, significant uncertainty exists about optimal online fundraising mechanisms, especially when large donor pools show substantial heterogeneities. We use an online natural field experiment with over 700,000 subjects to test theory on price discounts and show large differences in donation behavior between donors who have previously given money and/or volunteered. For example, framing the charity’s membership price as a discount increases response rates and decreases conditional contributions from former volunteers, but not from past money donors. Our study thereby demonstrates the importance of conditioning fundraising strategies on the specifics of past donation dimensions.

A Review Of The L-Band Auction, Peter Cramton

Peter Cramton

In May 2008, Ofcom’s L-band auction concluded. This was Ofcom’s second combinatorial clock auction. The auction used an innovative format intended to encourage an efficient assignment of the 17 lots. Eight bidders competed for the lots. In sharp contrast to the first combinatorial clock auction, the 10-40 GHz auction, in which each of the ten bidders won spectrum, in the L-band auction there was a single winner—Qualcomm won all the lots. This note briefly reviews the auction.

A Review Of The 10-40 Ghz Auction, Peter Cramton

Peter Cramton

In February 2008, Ofcom’s 10-40 GHz auction concluded. This was Ofcom’s first combinatorial clock auction. The auction used an innovative format intended to encourage an efficient assignment of the 27 lots. Each of the ten bidders won one or more lots. All 27 lots were assigned. This note briefly reviews the auction.

An Overview Of Combinatorial Auctions, Peter Cramton, Yoav Shoham, Richard Steinberg

Peter Cramton

No abstract provided.

Market-Based Alternatives For Managing Congestion At New York’S Laguardia Airport, Peter Cramton, Michael O. Ball, Lawrence M. Ausubel, Frank Berardino, George Donohue, Mark Hansen, Karla Hoffman

Peter Cramton

We summarize the results of a project that was motivated by the expiration of the “High Density Rule,” which defined the slot controls employed at New York’s LaGuardia Airport for more than 30 years. The scope of the project included the analysis of several administrative measures, congestion pricing options and slot auctions. The research output includes a congestion pricing procedure and also the specification of a slot auction mechanism. The research results are based in part on two strategic simulations. These were multi-day events that included the participation of airport operators, most notably the Port Authority of New York and …

Combinatorial Auctions, Peter Cramton, Yoav Shoham, Richard Steinberg

Peter Cramton

A comprehensive book on combinatorial auctions―auctions in which bidders can bid on packages of items. The book consists of original material intended for researchers, students, and practitioners of auction design. It includes a foreword by Vernon Smith, an introduction to combinatorial auctions, and twenty-three cross-referenced chapters in five parts. Part I covers mechanisms, such as the Vickrey auction and the ascending proxy auction. Part II is on bidding and efficiency issues. Part III examines computational issues and algorithmic considerations, especially the winner determination problem―how to identify the (tentative) winning set of bids that maximizes revenue. Part IV discusses implementation and …