Religious Identity and Climate-Sustainable Behavior
by Zixin “Finnie” Zhao
Abstract
What motivates individual action on climate change? The study focuses on the potential influence of religious identities. It employs a laboratory experiment to investigate how priming religious identity affects individuals’ donation behaviors to climate versus non-climate charities in a dictator game setting. In contrast with expectations, this study finds no significant evidence that an increase in religious identity salience influences religious individuals’ donation to climate, nor does it affect overall charitable donation behaviors, when demographic factors and perceptions about charity are controlled. Although failing to establish a causal relationship between religious identity and climate sustainable behavior or a linkage between religious identity and pro-social behavior, this research marks an innovative attempt to use experimental economics methodology to study factors that shape individual responses to the global climate challenge.
Professor Rachel Kranton, Faculty Advisor
Professor Michelle Connolly, Faculty Advisor
JEL Codes: C91; D64; Q54; Z12
The Sub-proportionality of Subjective Probability Weighting in Poker
by William Clark
Abstract
This study uses Texas Hold’em poker to investigate decision making under uncertainty and the concept of probability weighting, where individuals may overvalue or undervalue uncertain outcomes. I conduct an experiment to assess Cumulative Prospect Theory’s relevance to subjective probabilities in poker by simplifying the game to compare complex and simple gamble evaluations. The research aims to understand how risk preferences and probability estimation without complete information are influenced by individuals’ poker experience and framing effects. We find that deviations from what theory predicts in the subjective-probability Poker frame can be explained well by the framing effects made in the decision maker’s editing phase. By examining the difference in the predictive power of decision making models in explicit vs subjective probability gambles, the study seeks to improve comprehension of cognitive processes in navigating uncertainty.
Professor Philipp Sadowski, Faculty Advisor
Professor Grace Kim, Faculty Advisor
JEL Codes: C91, D80, D91
Economic Situations and Social Distance: Taxation and Donation
by Alexander Brandt
Abstract:
This experimental study evaluated the effects of two common economic situations – taxation and donation – on the social distance between participants in the situations, an original effect of interest that is the opposite of prior research. This study employed a novel survey framework, in which subjects gave money to others in the economic situations and socially judged recipients of their money. Findings mostly did not support predictions that the economic situations would differently affect social distance, but the novel framework enabled an effective test of the effect of economic situations on social distance and is a major contribution to the field.
Professor Rachel E. Kranton, Faculty Advisor
Professor Scott A. Huettel, Faculty Advisor
Professor Grace Kim, Seminar Advisor
JEL Codes: C91; D64; D89; D90
