Course Introduction and Methodology

Social preferences and time discounting: introduction - 5 lectures

1. Introduction

Dictator game, Ultimatum game
Models of social preferences

2. Other standard social-dilemma task

Trust game
Prisoners' Dilemma game
Public goods game (with and without punishment)
Joy of Destruction game

3. Social motives in organizations

Gift-exchange game
External validity
Reciprocity and inequality aversion on the labor market

4. Time discounting, limited self-control and demand for commitment

Exponential discounting, present-biased preferences, naivite and sophistication
Deadlines and demand for commitment
Dealing with imperfect compliance
Measuring inter-temporal preference and time inconsistent preferences

Selected topics on social behavior – 5 lectures

5. Formation of social preference: experiments with children

Development of preferences and willingness to cooperate during childhood
The role of parental socio-economic status
Impacts of early childhood policies

6. Social norms (JC)

Measurement of social norms
Social norms and economic behavior
Determinants and stability of social norms

7. Social pressure and pro-social behavior (JC)

Approaches to study social influence: peer effects, information cascades
Social influence in pro-social behavior
Social image concerns

8. Self-image and self-signaling

Salience of self
Moral wiggle room
Diffusion of responsibility

9. Decision-making in groups

Rationality and cognitive sophistication
Inter-personal behavior
Exploring mechanisms why group are less pro-social: communication in groups, social image, self-image and diffusion of responsibility.

Psychology of poverty– 4 lectures

10. Psychology of poverty

Behavioral sources of poverty: psychology of poverty
Income and cognition
Income and stress
Effect of thinking about poverty-related problems, hunger, noise, excessive alcohol consumption
Income and productivity

11. Selected issues in measurement

Measuring cognition
Measuring economic preferences in surveys
Measuring sensitive behaviors

12. Effects of stress on decision-making (JC)

Types of stress and stressors (TSST-G, Cold Pressor task)
Effect of stress on prosocial behavior
Effect of stress on risk preferences – issues to consider
Effect of stress on the willingness to compete

Willingness to compete – 1 lecture

13. Willingness to compete (JC)

Willingness to compete concept and external validity
Willingness to compete across settings – nature or nurture
Policy implications
Measurement issues

Discrimination, Identity – 4 lectures

14. Discrimination: natural field experiments

Theories: taste-based discrimination, statistical discrimination
Using field experiments to measuring the extent of discrimination
Attention discrimination: measuring decision-making process in the field
Uncovering sources of statistical discrimination

15. Discrimination: lab experiments

using lab experiments to separate taste-based and statistical discrimination

triggers of discriminatory preferences: social context, scapegoating

fighting discriminatory preferences: contact
development of discrimination during childhood
strategic responses to discrimination: name changing

16. Identity, Religion

Identity: definition
Priming techniques: crime, banking, religion
Economic well-being and religious identity

Misperceptions and belief updating

17. Information provision and survey experiments

· Effects of information provision on belief updating

· Advantages and disadvantages of survey experiments

o MTurk workers and representative samples

o Self-reported outcomes and behavioral measures

o Experimenter demand effects and obfuscation follow-up surveys

o Ensuring high-quality responses in online questionnaires (attention checks, survey consequentiality, etc.)

Methods, implementation

18. Selected aspects about transparency in experiments

· Ethical review

· Transparency and replications

· Pre-analysis plans

19. How to program a lab experiment? (TM, if situation allows it will take place at LEE at the University of Economics)

Laboratory experiments
Design Challenges
Programing in zTree

Additional topics if time allows

20. Legacies of violent conflicts

Why war experience may change social behavior
Evidence from surveys
Evidence from experiments

21. Randomized control trials in development economics: what works?

schooling: what is most efficient way to increase schooling?
demand for health products: shall health products be subsidized?
methodological aspects: balance checks, imperfect compliance
two stage randomization: separating selection and behavioral effects of prices