Behavioral economics is the integration of concepts from micro-economics into behavior analysis. Most of the research in behavioral economics has been done with non-human subjects and with drugs as reinforcers. This study represents an extension of previous research to assess money as a reinforcer with humans as subjects. The participants in this study solved math problems to earn money at various unit prices. Results indicate that demand of money adhered to the law of demand in that consumption decreased as unit prices increased. An underlying assumption is that consumption should be equivalent at different compositions of unit price. Replications of either the same or different compositions of unit price indicated that there were some discrepancies in consumption in this study.

Success is ultimately a story about human behavior. Regardless of the specific domain of the endeavor, the outcome is a product of the individuals involved. Businesses are a function of their employees and customers, just as societies are a function of their citizens and institutions. The ability to create a system that promotes human flourishing is one of the most vital tasks for any leader pursuing success. Yet the ability to break down a goal and engineer the proper procedure to achieve success has always been a somewhat daunting task. While many prosperous individuals have attempted to delineate their winning ways, the philosophies they preach sound more like encouraging poetry than a practical guide. Hard-work, ambition, and discipline - these are just some of the banalities used when trying to describe what it takes to win. However, the story behind greatness is more complex than that, and we are finally beginning to understand how and why. Recent scientific discoveries have a sparked an evolution of sorts; one that breaks down success and helps illuminate the conditions that encourage innovation, maximize potential, and drive mankind’s progress.

This dissertation consists of three essays which make use of laboratory experiments in order to investigate how procedural or contextual factors impact human behavior. / Economics

This thesis examines the relationship between the type of crime of which an inmate is convicted, the change in oxytocin level, and the level of generosity of that inmate. The level of generosity is measured using a behavioral economics task called the Ultimatum Game. Studies of oxytocin have demonstrated that it is connected to generosity so it is illuminating to study it in conjunction with the generosity measure obtained in the Ultimatum Game. The results of the experiment indicate that there is no correlation between the type of crime of which an inmate is convicted and his generosity level.

An examination into dyadic trust relationships within an audit engagement team and development of a model to efficiently optimize trust.

Prior research on corporations finds that there exists a large unexplained firm-specific heterogeneity in corporate behaviors stemming from the effects of managers. This research identifies managerial personalities and tests their effects on corporate behaviors both experimentally and empirically. First, the effects of managerial personalities on corporate financing decisions are tested using a laboratory experiment with managers in South Korea. The laboratory experimental market is à la Modigliani and Miller but with two frictions, bankruptcy costs and corporate taxation. Leverage choices of managers with particular personality traits are compared against the optimal capital structure computed from the static trade-off theory. The results show that extravert managers choose higher leverage ratios, with the effect being financially meaningful although not statistically significant. Secondly, I identify extravert CEOs and empirically measure its effects on corporate financing choices using Chief Executive Officers’ avocation data and corporate financial data of public, nonfinancial US companies between 1992 and 2011. The results of mean comparisons by group, fixed effects regressions, difference-in-difference regressions, and changes of leverages around CEO turnovers show that extravert CEOs tend to issue risky debt more when accessing external finance and maintain higher leverage ratios than their peers. Thirdly, I test the effects of managerial extraversion on executive compensation. I first offer an empirical compensation model of managerial bargaining power, and then empirically tests the prediction by identifying a personality trait relevant to bargaining power using a novel set of managerial hobbies data. The results provide an evidence that CEO bargaining power has an increasing effect on CEO compensation.

League of Legends is one of the most played video games in the world with millions of hours played each year. I examine if both a player’s experience and level of familiarity with teammates within the League of Legends virtual environment have significant relationships with individual performance. Utilizing regression analysis I have concluded that individual experience does not have a statistically significant effect on individual performance and that individual familiarity has a statistically significant negative effect on individual performance.

Online shopping has rapidly expanded in the last decade. Online shopping necessarily imposes delays on all transactions. Behavior analysis has long studied the effects of delay on choice. Additionally, a number of researchers are beginning to study consumer behavior using a behavior-analytic approach. The current study attempted to extend research focusing on consumer behavior in online contexts. The experimenters attempted to evaluate whether goods acquire functional properties and whether these properties influence consumer choice. The researchers were specifically interested in studying acquisition costs and durability and in simulating a natural online shopping environment. Results from the current study extend the findings showing that delay and price influence choice. The data from the current study provide mixed evidence for control by item durability.

Thesis advisor: Robert G. Murphy / Research has shown that individuals can be persuaded of a message in two ways: using a central (rational) approach, or through a peripheral (more “irrational”) approach in which irrelevant signals are seen as convincing. In addition, it is suggested that recent negative experiences cause individuals to favor the central route, whereas individuals in positive moods rely more heavily on the peripheral route. I extend these findings to the realm of financial advertising by presenting a simple model predicting that mutual funds will use more economically rational arguments when stock market returns have been low, and will cater to irrational inclinations when returns have been high. These predictions are supported by two case studies of print advertisements in Money and the Journal of Financial Planning from the period January 2003 to March 2009. / Thesis (BA) — Boston College, 2009. / Submitted to: Boston College. College of Arts and Sciences. / Discipline: College Honors Program. / Discipline: Economics Honors Program. / Discipline: Economics.

本论文针对 1990 年代以来中国社会在经济文化方面的巨大改变，归纳并指出一种新的“消费意识形态”在中国业已历史地形成并取代日渐式微的传统 意识形态，成为宰制当代中国社会的主导力量。论文批判地回顾了1949 年以后中国大陆语境中意识形态涵义的历史嬗变，以四个具有典型意义的时尚报刊和广告案例、广告事件为例，从不同侧面解析了广告形象以及广告产业如何作为 中介与以时尚报刊为代表的文化工业一起，参与当代中国“消费意识形态”建 构的社会过程。 论文通过对“消费意识形态”所遮蔽的当代中国社会问题的揭示，对“消费意识形态”在当代中国社会发生影响的深度和广度的阐释，回应了九十年代以来在中国思想界有较大影响的“后六·四”文化论争中的一些重要问题，展现了文化研究在中国大陆介入现实社会思考和批判的可能空间。