We extend the literature structurally estimating social preferences by accounting for the desire to adhere to social norms. Our representative agent is strongly motivated by norms and failing to account for this causes us to overestimate how much agents care about helping those who are worse...

We investigate the relationship between political attitudes and prosociality in a survey of a representative sample of the U.S. population during the first summer of the COVID-19 pandemic. We find that an experimental measure of prosociality correlates positively with adherence to protective...

We investigate the stability of self-control at the population level. Analyzing repeated Brief Self-Control Scale scores, we demonstrate that self-control exhibits a high degree of mean-level, rank-order, and individual-level stability over the medium term. Changes in self-control are not...

This study investigates the predictive power of self-control for individuals and their children using population representative data. We use the well-established Brief Self-Control Scale to demonstrate that people's trait self-control is highly predictive of their life outcomes. Higher...

We show that the disposition to focus on favorable or unfavorable outcomes of risky situations affects willingness to take risk as measured by the general risk question. We demonstrate that this disposition, which we call risk conception, is strongly associated with optimism, a stable facet of...

This paper provides strong evidence supporting the long-standing speculation that decision-making in groups has a dark side, by magnifying the prevalence of anti-social behavior towards outsiders. A large-scale experiment implemented in Slovakia and Uganda (N=2,309) reveals that deciding in a...

Individuals frequently face intertemporal decisions. For the purposes of economic analysis, the preference parameters assumed to govern these decisions are generally considered to be stable economic primitives. However, evidence on the stability of time preferences is notably lacking. In a large...

This paper tests the broadly adopted assumption that people apply a single discount rate to the utility from different sources of consumption. Using unique data from two surveys conducted in rural Uganda including both hypothetical and real choices over different goods, the paper elicits time...

Social stress can cause physical and mental harm. It is therefore not surprising that public health policy makers have sought to identify and implement policies aimed at tackling this social ill. A frequently prescribed remedy is to reduce social stress by reducing income inequality, which is...

Lack of information about COVID-19 and its spread may have contributed to excess mortality at the pandemic's onset. In April and May 2020, we implemented a randomized controlled trial with more than 3,000 households in 150 Bangladeshi villages. Our one-to-one information campaign via phone...