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on Neuroeconomics |
| By: | Gabriella Conti; Sarah Cattan; Christine Farquharson |
| Abstract: | Early childhood programmes frequently lose effectiveness at scale, yet the role of the workforce remains poorly understood. We document substantial heterogeneity in workforce effectiveness in England's national home-visiting programme for first-time teenage mothers, despite a highly-structured curriculum and well-qualified staff. Exploiting quasi-random assignment of mothers to family nurses, we estimate that a one standard deviation increase in workforce effectiveness raises children's cognitive and socio-emotional development by 0.20-0.23 SD. Structural quality - observable worker characteristics - does not predict effectiveness, but process quality - how visits are delivered - does. Greater effectiveness is linked with improvements in maternal mental health and risk behaviours. |
| Keywords: | early childhood development; home visiting; workforce quality; process quality; scaling; Family Nurse Partnership |
| JEL: | I18 I38 J13 J24 |
| Date: | 2026–04 |
| URL: | https://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:crm:wpaper:26124 |
| By: | Cobb-Clark, Deborah (University of Sydney); Silva Goncalves, Juliana (University of Sydney); Tymula, Agnieszka (University of Sydney); Wang, Xueting (RMIT) |
| Abstract: | Self-control, attention, and impulsivity jointly support goal-directed behavior yet are often examined in isolation with heterogeneous measures. We integrate validated self-reported scales with a hybrid, incentivized behavioral task that synthesizes two canonical experimental designs and adds novel extensions to measure these constructs in a typical work context. Using data from a preregistered four-session online study (N = 443 adults), we characterize the cross-relationships and the relationships between different measures of self-control, attention, and impulsivity and evaluate their contributions to effort allocation over time. More broadly, the study advances an emerging research program that leverages laboratory settings with well-structured economic incentives to examine the role of personality traits and cognitive limitations in economic decision making. |
| Keywords: | self-control, impulsivity, attention, measurement |
| JEL: | D81 D83 D91 |
| Date: | 2026–05 |
| URL: | https://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:iza:izadps:dp18646 |
| By: | Judith M. Delaney; Paul J. Devereux |
| Abstract: | We use population-level administrative data covering secondary school students in England to study how mathematical and verbal skills shape education and labour market outcomes. Following cohorts completing national exams at age 16 through higher education and into employment until age 34, we show that mathematics and verbal skills operate through fundamentally different pathways. Verbal skills strongly predict educational attainment-including college enrolment, graduation, and postgraduate study-while mathematics skills generate substantially larger earnings returns. At ages 30-34, moving from the 25th to the 75th percentile of the mathematics skill distribution is associated with 29% higher earnings, compared with 14% for verbal. This divergence operates partly through field-of-study choice: individuals with stronger verbal skills disproportionately select into fields with higher graduation rates but lower earnings returns, while those with stronger mathematics skills enter STEM and other high-paying majors. Gender differences in skills explain the female advantage in college attendance and part of the STEM gap but have little effect on the gender earnings gap due to offsetting effects across these pathways: women's verbal advantage facilitates educational access but also steers them toward lower-return fields. |
| Keywords: | returns to skills |
| JEL: | J24 |
| Date: | 2026–04 |
| URL: | https://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:crm:wpaper:26114 |
| By: | Fang, Ximeng; Innocenti, Stefania; Vogt, Sonja (Faculty of Business and Economics, University of Lausanne) |
| Abstract: | Scalable behavioural interventions often struggle to engage the cognitive and psychological mechanisms that underlie durable changes in preferences and habits. This study provides a proof of concept for an underexplored intervention format: edutainment through video games. Partnering with a large video game company, we develop a game that embeds educational content on sustainable food consumption into an entertaining storyline. In a pre-registered field experiment (N = 4, 034 UK adults), participants are randomly assigned to play either one of three treatment versions of the game or a control version without environmental content. Real-world food choice behaviour is measured through incentivised online supermarket tasks. Relative to the control group, treated participants select grocery baskets with 20% lower environmental impact immediately after gameplay, an effect that remains at 8–10% in a follow-up 2–3 weeks later. Behavioural change results from a combination of knowledge gains, short-term salience and preference change. Strikingly, effects were particularly persistent among subjects with low baseline sustainability. Further evidence suggests that the intervention was effective partly because it provided an enjoyable experience and affected a rich set of beliefs and attitudes, including personal norms, efficacy, and perceived social norms. |
| Date: | 2026–05 |
| URL: | https://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:amz:wpaper:2026-13 |
| By: | Jialu (Gloria) Dou; Rania Gihleb; Osea Giuntella; Jakub Lonsky |
| Abstract: | We examine the impact of California’s Senate Bill 328 (SB 328), the first statewide mandate requiring later school start times for middle and high schools, on adolescent sleep, mental health, and academic outcomes. Using difference-in-differences and eventstudy designs across five data sources, we find that SB 328 increased the share of students sleeping at least 8 hours per night by 13%, meeting the CDC-recommended minimum for this age group. Average mental health effects are imprecisely estimated, but boys show significant reductions in sadness, hopelessness, and suicidal ideation, and Hispanic students, who experienced the largest sleep-timing shifts, show parallel reductions in difficulty concentrating; together these patterns are consistent with a dose-response relationship between sleep improvement and mental well-being. Math and English scores in grade 8 improved by approximately 0.08–0.10 standard deviations, with the largest gains among Hispanic and economically disadvantaged students. A within-state analysis using teachers’ commute arrival times as a proxy for pre-policy school start times corroborates these findings, and shows academic gains accumulating over 2023–2025 alongside a suggestive decline in high school dropout rates. The absence of effects on chronic absenteeism rules out an attendance-driven mechanism, pointing instead to the direct cognitive benefits of aligning school schedules with adolescents’ biological rhythms. |
| JEL: | I0 I1 I20 J0 |
| Date: | 2026–05 |
| URL: | https://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:nbr:nberwo:35184 |