Cho-Kreps(1987)提出以equilibrium dominance的方法找出直覺均衡(intuitive equilibrium)的概念，使得最終均衡收斂至直覺均衡。但是根據實驗結果顯示，均衡的考量不是那麼輕鬆而簡單的，由實驗二我們可以看出，運用``情境模擬''的方法，建議參賽者對於決策的認知行為，使得參賽者的認知模糊化後運用equilibrium dominance的方法，會使最終均衡呈現環循的趨勢而並不會收斂至直覺均衡的結果。此外Cho-Kreps(1987)所提出的文章中，可以dominate掉非直覺均衡有一個重要的關鍵變項就是---``演說(Speech)''，由實驗三我們可以得知加入``演說''這個變項後，不能明顯看出會使最終均衡``加速''收斂至直覺均衡。但是由實驗四的結果我們可得知，在情境模擬的環境下使參賽者的認知模糊，那麼此時加入``演說``這個變項確實能發揮其重要性，使得參賽者雙方的認知更清楚化，以便能排除非直覺均衡而收斂至直覺均衡另外Cho-Kreps(1987)所討論參賽者在做決策的方法中並未說明參賽者的風險態度和決策行為的關係，若縮短參賽者雙方的報酬差距，使得參賽者的決策風險變小，使雙方參賽者願意``賭''的誘因增加。由實驗六的結果可以得知可運用``學習''的方法，使得參賽者靠自己本身的學習來確認其應該已知的認知，以降低參賽者對雙方認知的不確定性，因此使得雙方``賭''的意願降低以使最終均衡可快速收斂至直覺均衡。最後由人格風險量表整理可得風險喜好程度的參賽者比較願意去賭，因此風險態度愈高愈不易使均衡收斂至直覺均衡。總括來說，Cho-Kreps(1987)所提出運用equilibrium dominance的方法求得合理的直覺均衡的概念必須是在參賽者雙方對於決策行為認知的不確定性小的時候才能成立。

Neuroeconomics is an interdisciplinary research program with the goal of building a biological model of decision making in economic environments. Neuroeconomists ask, how does the embodied brain enable the mind (or groups of minds) to make economic decisions? By combining techniques from cognitive neuroscience and experimental economics we can now watch neural activity in real time, observe how this activity depends on the economic environment, and test hypotheses about how the emergent mind makes economic decisions. Neuroeconomics allows us to better understand both the wide range of heterogeneity in human behavior, and the role of institutions as ordered extensions of our minds. The brain is the most amazing complex organ in known universe.The brain is a organ with most amazingly magic infinite potential. Neuroplasticity: Transforming the Mind by Changing the Brain.Neuroplasticity refers to structural and functional changes in the brain that are brought about by training and experience. The brain is the organ that is designed to change in response to experience.The decision theories can be categorized into three paradigms:the normative,descriptive and prescriptive theories.The decision processing have four steps:accumulation of sensory evidence,integration of sensory signals with reward expectation and prior knowledge,comparision of current reward expectation with that in prior experience,and the selection of behavioral response.

1. Introduction This dissertation consists of six chapters that span a very diverse set of topics. Yet, it has two unifying themes, economics and biology, that tie it together. The first four chapters present the principal findings from a project that was initiated jointly with David Cesarini and Magnus Johannesson, and that applies the twin method from behavioral genetics to economics. The last two chapters instead use a simple regression framework and evidence from biological anthropology to investigate recent claims regarding the effects of child bearing and past slave trades. 2. Genes and economics There is a small, but rapidly growing, literature studying the genetic and environmental origins of economic behavior and outcomes (Bowles et al., 2005; Beauchamp et al., 2011). Until recently, this literature focused exclusively on outcomes, and in particular income. In chapters 1-4 we instead focus on economic behavior and decision-making. Previous behavioral genetic work outside the domains of economics has changed the way that we think about a number of behavioral traits. In this literature it is typically found that i) variation is heritable ii) genetic factors are more important than family environment iii) a large fraction of variation cannot be explained by neither genes nor family environment (Turkheimer, 2000; Plomin et al., 2009). However, compared to many other disciplines, and psychology in particular, economics is lagging behind. In fact, as recently as 2009 the leading text book in behavioral genetics described economics as "still essentially untouched by genetic research" (Plomin et al., 2009, p. 353). Hopefully, the chapters in this dissertation can help to improve on this somewhat unsatisfactory state of the art. Chapters 1 and 2 study economic decision-making in the laboratory using the twin method. More specifically, we study the ultimatum and dictator games alongside risky gambles, using same-sex twin pairs as our subject pool. Given a few additional assumptions, the fact that identical twins have, in expectation, a twice as high coefficient of genetic relatedness as fraternal twins implies that we can study the genetic and environmental contributions to variation in behavior by studying twin correlations in observed choices. Chapters 3 and 4 apply the same method to actual portfolio choices associated with a far-reaching pension reform, as well as to a set of standard behavioral anomalies. Taken together, these four chapters provide strong evidence in favor of the hypothesis that genes influence economic decision-making. Thus, economic behavior does not appear to be much different from other types of behavior. 3. Economics and history The last two chapters of the dissertation turn to the past, rather than genes, in an effort to evaluate recent findings regarding two important welfare outcomes. In chapter 5 we investigate Nunn’s (2008) claim that past slave trades had a negative impact on current economic performance in Africa. By extending the sample period back in time we demonstrate that this relationship was not significant in 1960. In addition, by applying Nunn’s method to an episode of large scale slave raiding in Italy, we demonstrate that there exists a similar negative relationship across Italian regions, although it becomes insignificant when geographical controls are included. Intriguingly, going back to 1960, the coefficient on slave raids for Italy also has a similar time trend to that for Africa. Taking these facts, and our reading of the historical and anthropological literature, which is much different from that of Nunn, into account we do not find much support for the hypothesis that the African slave trades had a negative impact on current economic performance. Finally, chapter 6 investigates the large and negative relationship between giving birth to a son, rather than a daughter, and maternal longevity that was documented in a Sami hunter-gatherer population from Finland (Helle et al., 2002). Using a substantially larger sample of pre-industrial Swedish Sami we find no evidence in favor of such a relationship. 4. Brasklapp Five of the chapters in this dissertation (Ch. 1-4 &amp; 6) are slightly altered versions of previously published papers (Wallace et al., 2007; Cesarini et al., 2009 a, b; 2010; 2011). Unfortunately, the fact that earlier versions of the chapters were prepared as separate articles for five different journals means that they can at times appear both repetitive, and in terms of notation and formatting, somewhat inconsistent. I apologize to the reader for these inconveniences. / <p>Diss. Stockholm :  Stockholm School of Economics, 2011. Introduction together with 6 papers</p>

This thesis presents two classes of models of boundedly rational decision makers - one with application to finance and the other to pricing. It consists of three parts. The first part of the thesis investigates the impact of investors' boundedly rational forecasting on asset price bubbles. We present a class of models, called extrapolation-correction models, of boundedly rational investor behavior. That is, the investors in our model, quite reasonably, use data available to them, i.e. past price data, to form forecasts about future prices. We relate the model parameters to various behavioral aspects like investor memory, caution/confidence, and panic. We present the resulting dynamical system model of asset price bubbles and relate the behavior of the dynamical system to the parameters capturing investor forecasting behavior. We show that, depending on the behavioral parameters, the associated dynamical system can converge to the fundamental value, go into predictable price cycles, or go into unpredictable price cycles. In particular, we find that the greater the weight investors' forecasts put on the most recent observations, the greater the tendency for the asset prices to exhibit cycles, forming positive and negative bubbles. We also find that when forecasts are strongly affected by recent prices, the price process becomes chaotic and it becomes increasingly difficult to forecast future prices accurately. The second part of the thesis addresses the question: How do investors make their price forecasts? We present the design of an experiment where investors participate in a virtual asset market run over a computer network. During the course of the experiment, the participants report their price forecasts and enter buy and sell orders. The computer software determines the market clearing prices. Despite full disclosure of the assets' dividends and the fundamental value, the price trajectories in all three experimental sessions exhibited cycles. We calibrated various models, including rational expectations based models and the extrapolation-correction family of models presented in the first part of the thesis. The results indicate that rational expectations hypothesis does not provide an accurate model of forecast formation. Moreover, a simple one-parameter exponential smoothing model is much better at modeling forecast formation, with the extrapolation-correction models making the fit slightly better. The third part of the thesis explores a different aspect of customer rationality - that of customer impatience - and its effect on pricing of product versions. We consider a setting in which impatient customers are faced with frequent product introductions, for example, products like Apple iPhones. This raises the following questions regarding customers: Given the pricing strategy of the firm, what are the optimal buying behaviors of the customers? How does customer buying behavior change in relation to impatience? We consider two settings. In the first setting, the firm offers a trade-in price for existing customers and a higher full price for new customers. In the second setting, the firm offers the same prices to new and existing customers, however there is an introductory full price and a discounted price later in the product cycle. We model the customer's problem in these two settings and characterize their optimal actions as a function of the price parameters. We also analyze the bilevel program for the firm's pricing decisions. We see that in both settings considered there are certain well-defined regions in the price space wherein the firm's optimal decision lies. We also provide some numerical computations to study the behavior of the optimal prices as the cost per unit increases.

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Cette thèse explore l’impact des technologies de l'information et de la communication (TIC) sur le comportement des employés. Alors que la théorie néoclassique de la croissance considère les TIC comme un outil utilisé dans le processus de production, nous nous sommes basé sur une théorie qui stipule que les technologies ont deux aspects différents. Les technologies de la communication centralisent la prise de décision tandis que les technologies de l'information déplacent la prise de décision au niveau de l'employé. Nous avons abordé les questions du meilleur type de technologie pour l’amélioration de la performance des employés, des coûts engendrés par l'utilisation de ce type de technologies et de l’impact de la surveillance informatique dans la réduction de ces coûts. Nous avons utilisé la méthode expérimentale pour répondre à ces questions. Nos résultats montrent que les employés préfèrent utiliser les technologies de l'information et ceux qui les utilisent sont plus productifs que les autres. Nous trouvons également que l’environnement de travail et les technologies qui poussent la prise de décision au niveau de l'employé pourraient engendrer des coûts importants pour l’entreprise. Cependant, la surveillance informatique est efficace pour réduire ces coûts mais son effet diminue au fil du temps. Nos résultats montrent que les employés les plus productifs sont ceux qui ont passé le plus de temps sur internet. Donner aux employés les informations constantes et détaillées (sur leur performance) produites par les technologies pourrait être une façon efficace de les sensibiliser sur l’ampleur de la surveillance informatique afin de les rendre plus performants. / This dissertation explores the impact of the use of Information and Communication Technologies (ICT) on employees’ behaviors. While the neoclassical growth theory considers ICT as an input used in the production process, we relied on a literature in the organizational economic field which states that technologies have two different key aspects. Information technologies push down the decision making at the employee level while Communication technologies centralize the decision making. We addressed the issue of the more efficient technologies for workers’ performance, the costs generated by using the most efficient type of technologies and how the technology-based monitoring may be useful to reduce those costs. We used the experimental methodology since the collection of individuals and team's production is hard with survey data. Our results show that employees prefer information technologies and those who use it are more productive than others. We also show that work organization and technologies which push down the decision making at the employee level could entail some substantial costs for the firm. Indeed, employees are more willing to engage on time wasting activities in order to influence the principal’s decision when they can participate to the decision making process. However IT monitoring is quite successful at reducing those costs. Technology monitoring implies a disciplining effect at the beginning when the sanction is available but this effect lessens over time. Our results show that employees are more productive when they spend more time on internet. Giving constant heightened feedbacks provided by ICT to employees about their productivity should be the better way to sensitize them about the extent of technology monitoring in order to increase their performance.

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Malgré une amélioration significative de la place des femmes sur le marché du travail depuis les années 60, des inégalités femmes-hommes en termes de salaire et de position dans l’emploi subsistent toujours. Dans cette thèse, nous utilisons à la fois des données d’enquête et des données expérimentales afin d’étudier ce problème. Nous réalisons tout d’abord une étude empirique sur données d’enquête afin d’identifier les déterminants structurels de ces différences femmes-hommes. Nos résultats indiquent qu’une part significative de ces inégalités ne peut être expliquée par des écarts en termes de caractéristiques observables. Nous faisons ensuite appel à l’économie expérimentale afin d’explorer deux facteurs potentiels de cet écart résiduel : la discrimination et les différences femmes-hommes en termes de préférences. Nous nous intéressons à la discrimination en réalisant une première expérience contrôlée en laboratoire. Nous observons une discrimination à l’embauche à l’encontre des femmes dans un cadre d’information imparfaite. Cette discrimination semble provenir du manque d’information à disposition de l’employeur, plutôt que de ses préférences. Dans une seconde expérience en laboratoire, nous mettons en avant les différences entre femmes et hommes en termes d’attitude face à la compétition. Nos résultats suggèrent que les femmes sont moins enclines à entrer en compétition, notamment car elles ont moins confiance en leurs aptitudes que les hommes. Si la discrimination est un facteur potentiel des inégalités femmes-hommes sur le marché du travail, nous montrons dans ces travaux que les différences en termes de préférences sont aussi à considérer. / Despite a substantial evolution in the participation of women in the labor market since the 60s, there still subsist significant gender inequalities in earnings and occupations. In this dissertation, we use both survey and experimental data to address this issue. We first undertake an empirical study using survey data to isolate the structural determinants of these gender differences. Our findings indicate that a significant part of these inequalities could not be explained by gender differences in observed characteristics. Then, we appeal to experimental economics in order to explore two potential factors of this residual gap: employer discrimination and gender differences in preferences. We first implement a controlled experiment in laboratory to address the issue of discrimination. We find evidence of hiring discrimination against women when information is imperfect. This discrimination seems to arise from the lack of information available to the employer, rather than from her preferences. In a second laboratory experiment, we shed light on gender differences in attitude toward competition. Our results suggest that women are less inclined to enter competition, especially since they are less self-confident than men. Although discrimination consists in a potential factor of gender inequalities in the labor market, we show in this dissertation that gender differences in preferences have also to be considered.

Conspicuous consumption is a form of economic behaviour in which social pressure influences consumption decisions. Considering the current understanding of the detrimental ecological impact of excessive consumption practices, this paper overviews the potential to lessen wasteful consumption trends by utilising conspicuous consumption. This paper overviews research into this phenomenon, commencing with Thorstein Veblen’s work at the end of the nineteenth century. Combining this with research from sociologist Pierre Bourdieu, this paper suggests potential indicators of sustainable consumption tendencies, including personality traits and group dynamics. The empirical aspect of this study successfully replicates the findings of a recent investigation into conspicuous consumption; that is, that consumption increases when conducted in public and income is linked to status. This study has been updated to include various aspects of sustainability behaviour and knowledge and has found trends associated with students of sustainability in Uppsala, Sweden. Furthermore, this paper suggests that the encouragement of conspicuous forms of sustainability could inspire sustainable consumption trends, or potentially lead to a reduction of overall consumption. Finally, this paper makes recommendations for policy makers in order to encourage social sustainability practices, building upon nascent movements such as 'Flygskam' ('Flight Shame') and successful anti-smoking strategies.