1) Dan Friedman
Abstract
2) Navin Kartik
Abstract of Abstract: We compare voting behavior under simultaneous and sequential voting mechanisms, in the information aggregation approach to elections. We are particularly interested in whether sequential voting leads to history-dependent behavior and momentum effects.
theory paper: http://econ.ucsd.edu/~nkartik/Papers/seq_voting.pdf
experimental paper: http://econ.ucsd.edu/~nkartik/Papers/infoagg_exp.pdf
3) Guillaume Fréchette
Abstract: Once the legislature is faced with an exogenous budget constraint, public goods (both level and scope) have to be determined by some collective-choice procedure. We experimentally investigate a recent model in which legislators allocate a fixed budget between collective public goods and particularistic goods. Our results confirm that when legislators value of collective goods is relatively low, then the budget is almost exclusively allocated to particularistic goods within a minimum winning coalition. However, in the "mixed region" in which both collective goods and particularistic goods are provided, the share of the budget devoted to the public good decreases as the relative value of the public good decreases, which is inconsistent with the stationary subgame perfect equilibrium prediction of the bargaining game but can be rationalized given the subjects voting behavior.
4) Lise Vesterlund
Abstract: Charities often let the sum of contributions determine the quantity of services to provide. Some organizations, however, have the option of setting a minimum threshold necessary for provision of the public good, allowing donors to pledge donations contingent on the threshold being reached. Contributions are only collected when sufficient funds have been pledged. We show that contribution-maximizing fundraisers who have such a strategy available to them will choose to use it. In contrast to the traditional model of voluntary contributions, in this model inefficiency arises as a result of over provision of the public good. Examining the environment in the laboratory demonstrates behavior very much in line with the theory. While groups contribute too little absent a threshold, the public good may be overprovided in the presence of a threshold.
5) Tanya Rosenblat
Abstract: Using a large sample of 656 men and women, we examine how subjects' confidence about their relative performance in an IQ test is affected by noisy
feedback. Our experimental design allows us to cleanly separate subjects' heterogeneous prior beliefs from the updating process because we only track subjects' beliefs of being among the top half of performers. We find strong evidence for conservatism and asymmetry: subjects tend to update too little compared to the Bayesian benchmark and they tend to react more strongly to positive compared to negative feedback. Subjects who exhibit stronger asymmetry are also more confident prior to the IQ test. Men are significantly less conservative than women: therefore high-performing men become more confident than high-performing women after receiving the same feedback even when they start from the same initial confidence level. Men and women do not differ significantly in their asymmetry in our sample. To analyze the relationship between belief updating and behavior we replicate the design of Niederle and Vesterlund (2006) for a subgroup of 102 subjects. We find that conservatism is negatively correlated with entry into competition while asymmetry is positively correlated with entry into competition.
paper: http://trosenblat.web.wesleyan.edu/home/gender_v4.pdf
6) Jim Andreoni
Abstract: This paper suggests an explanation for the phenomenon of diverging opinions. We present a Bayesian model with two-dimensional uncertainty and multiple agents in which there is no prior disagreement about an optimal decision. Nevertheless, a disagreement among agents may arise and continually increase if additional information becomes available. The model provides testable implications about how occurrence of disagreement depends on the structure of new information. We verify our model experimentally by showing that disagreement is more likely to be observed in the experimental treatment than in the control treatment. Furthermore, in the experimental treatment, the disagreement tends to increase more for the subjects whose behavior is more consistent with expected payoff maximization.
7) Brit Grosskopf and Rajiv Sarin
Abstract
8) Gary Charness
Abstract: We investigate the effect of paying students to complete 75 hours of studying at a monitored location over a five-week period. Students were recruited both from a large introductory class and from students in the regular experimental subject pool. In one treatment, the 75 hours of studying must be composed of at least 12 hours during the first week, at least 24 hours by the end of the second week, etc. In the second treatment, 75 hours of studying must be completed, but there were no weekly studying requirements. While our ex ante prediction was that imposing a weekly structure would help procrastinating students avoid getting too far behind, we instead find that a higher proportion of students achieve the 75-hour target in the time-unstructured treatment. The patterns of study time show a pronounced weekly cycle; remarkably, this pattern is almost identical for both treatments. While we cannot reject the models of quasi-hyperbolic discounting, these patterns seem more consistent with the notion of willpower. Finally, we find evidence that, over time, students who achieve the studying goal improve their performance in the introductory class relative to those students who did not.
9) Ulrike Malmendier
Abstract
10) Stefano DellaVigna
Abstract: Laboratory experiments in psychology find that media violence increases aggression in the short run. We analyze whether media violence affects violent crime in the field. We exploit variation in the violence of blockbuster movies from 1995 to 2004, and study the effect on same-day assaults. We find that violent crime decreases on days with larger theater audiences for violent movies. The effect is partly due to voluntary incapacitation: between 6PM and 12AM, a one million increase in the audience for violent movies reduces violent crime by 1.1 to 1.3 percent. After exposure to the movie, between 12AM and 6AM, violent crime is reduced by an even larger percent. This finding is explained by the self-selection of violent individuals into violent movie attendance, leading to a substitution away from more volatile activities. In particular, movie attendance appears to reduce alcohol consumption. Like the laboratory experiments, we find indirect evidence that movie violence increases violent crime; however, this effect is dominated by the reduction in crime induced by a substitution away from more dangerous activities. Overall, our estimates suggest that in the short-run violent movies deter almost 1,000 assaults on an average weekend. While our design does not allow us to estimate long-run effects, we find no evidence of medium-run effects up to three weeks after initial exposure
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