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on Cognitive and Behavioural Economics |
| By: | Bram Cadsby; Maroš Servátka (University of Canterbury); Fei Song |
| Abstract: | We develop and test experimentally the argument that gender/family and/or professional identities, activated through psychological priming, may influence preference for competition. We focus on female professionals for whom these identities may conflict and male professionals for whom they may be reinforcing. We primed MBA-student participants by administering questionnaires that concerned either gender/family or professional issues. Subsequently, participants undertook a real-effort task and chose between piece-rate and competitive-tournament compensation. Identity priming, moderated by gender, significantly affected preference for competitive pay. This relationship was partially mediated by beliefs about one‟s performance ranking. The implications of our results are profound. The decision to avoid competition made by many female professionals may be driven not by lack of ability, but rather by the increased salience of gender/family identity, influenced by marriage and motherhood over time. Indeed, activation of internalized identities might not only drive the experimental results, but also have strong implications for career choices and job performance of women, thus contributing to the observed gender and motherhood wage gaps. |
| Date: | 2011–08–02 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:cbt:econwp:11/31&r=cbe |
| By: | Fehr, Ernst; Hoff, Karla |
| Abstract: | Economists have traditionally treated preferences as exogenously given. Preferences are assumed to be influenced by neither beliefs nor the constraints people face. As a consequence, changes in behaviour are explained exclusively in terms of changes in the set of feasible alternatives. Here the authors argue that the opposition to explaining behavioural changes in terms of preference changes is ill-founded, that the psychological properties of preferences render them susceptible to direct social influences, and that the impact of"society"on preferences is likely to have important economic and social consequences. |
| Keywords: | Biodiversity,Labor Policies,Economic Theory&Research,Cultural Policy,Gender and Social Development |
| Date: | 2011–08–01 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:wbk:wbrwps:5760&r=cbe |
| By: | Kerri Brick; Martine Visser; Justine Burns |
| Abstract: | We estimate the risk attitudes of a large sample of small-scale fishers from various fishing communities along the west coast of South Africa, using subjects’ choices over lotteries with real monetary prizes. We find that participants are moderately risk averse and that risk attitudes vary with certain socio-demographic variables. In particular, females are found to be more risk averse than their male counterparts, while quota holders are more risk loving. Logistic regression analysis indicates that risk attitudes have implications for non-compliance with fisheries regulation. Specifically, greater risk aversion translates into a reduction in the odds of catching illegally. Furthermore, in the case of gender, female fishers and female fishers with fishing rights are more likely to comply with fisheries regulation. These findings have important implications for the characterisation of risk attitudes in fisheries policy applications and for the management of marine resources. |
| Keywords: | risk attitudes risk aversion experiments fishing rights compliance and South Africa |
| JEL: | D81 Q22 |
| Date: | 2011 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:rza:wpaper:227&r=cbe |
| By: | Chong Huang (Department of Economics, University of Pennsylvania) |
| Abstract: | This paper studies the interaction between coordination and social learning in a dynamic regime change game. Social learning provides public information to which players overreact due to the coordination motive. So coordination affects the aggregation of private signals through players' optimal choices. Such endogenous provision of public information results in inefficient herds with positive probability, even though private signals have an unbounded likelihood ratio property. Therefore, social learning is a source of coordination failure. An extension shows that if players could individually learn, inefficient herding disappears, and thus coordination is successful almost surely. This paper also demonstrates that along the same history, the belief convergence differs in different equilibria. Finally, social learning can lead to higher social welfare when the fundamentals are bad. |
| Keywords: | Coordination, social learning, inefficient herding, dynamic global game, common belief |
| JEL: | C72 C73 D82 D83 |
| Date: | 2011–08–05 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:pen:papers:11-021&r=cbe |
| By: | Jonathana E. Alevy (Department of Economics, University of Alaska Anchorage); Craig E. Landry (Department of Economics, East Carolina University); John A. List (Department of Economics, University of Chicago) |
| Abstract: | A pillar of behavioral research is the view that preferences are constructed during the value elicitation process, but it is unclear whether, and to what extent, such biases influence real market equilibria. This paper examines the “anchoring” phenomenon in the field. The first experiment produces evidence that inexperienced consumers can be anchored in the value elicitation process, yet there is little evidence that experienced agents are influenced by anchors. The second experiment finds that anchors have only transient effects on prices and quantities traded: aggregate market outcomes converge to the intersection of supply and demand after a few market periods. |
| Keywords: | field experiment, anchoring, valuation, experience |
| JEL: | C92 M11 |
| Date: | 2011 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:ala:wpaper:2011-02&r=cbe |
| By: | Viitanen, Tarja (University of Otago) |
| Abstract: | This paper examines the effect of parental divorce during childhood on generalized trust later on in life using Australian HILDA panel data. The dependent variable is composed of answers to the statement: “Generally speaking, most people can be trusted”. The main explanatory variables include the occurrence of parental divorce for the whole sample and the age at which parents divorced for the sub-sample. The analysis is conducted using random effects ordered probit, correlated random effects ordered probit and instrumental variables ordered probit models. The results indicate that the level of generalized trust is significantly affected by parental divorce for both men and women. This main result is very robust to alternative specifications. Furthermore, there is a marginally significant effect on the expressed level of generalized trust due to age at which parents divorced for women, but not men. |
| Keywords: | parental divorce, generalized trust, HILDA, random effects ordered probit, instrumental variables ordered probit |
| JEL: | J12 J13 H8 Z13 |
| Date: | 2011–08 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:iza:izadps:dp5898&r=cbe |
| By: | Raberto, Marco; Teglio, Andrea; Cincotti, Silvano |
| Abstract: | The recent financial crises pointed out the central role of public and private debt in modern economies. However, even if debt is a recurring topic in discussions about the current economic situation, economic modelling does not take into account debt as one of the crucial determinants of economic dynamics. Our contribution, in this paper, is to investigate the issues of borrowing and debt load by means of computational experiments, performed in the environment of the agent-based Eurace simulator. We aim to shed some light on the relation between debt and the main economic indicators. Our results clearly confirm that the amount of credit money in the economy is a very important variable, that can affect economic performance in a twofold way: fostering growth or pushing the economy into recession or crisis. The outcomes of our experiments show a rich scenario of interactions between real and financial variables in the economy, and therefore represents a truly innovative tool for the study of economics. -- |
| Keywords: | Agent-based computational economics,debt,leverage,credit money,economic crisis |
| JEL: | E2 E3 E44 E51 |
| Date: | 2011 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:zbw:ifwedp:201131&r=cbe |