We propose that religion impacts trust and trustworthiness in ways that depend on how individuals are socially identified and connected. Religiosity and religious affiliation may serve as markers for statistical discrimination. Further, affiliation to the same religion may enhance group...

The standard chicken game is a popular model of certain important real scenarios but does not allow for the escalation behaviour these are typically associated with. This is problematic if the critical, final decisions in these scenarios are sensitive to previous escalation. We introduce and...

We explore the scientific potential of virtual worlds for experimental economists. In particular, we report the results of a series of virtual world experiments designed to examine the suitability of (a) users as subjects and (b) the computer interface as an experimental platform. Formal results...

This article surveys the experimental economics approach to the study of religion. The field has a place in the context of the scientific study of religion generally and the social psychology of religion in particular, but employs distinct economic methods which promise new and different...

Welfare economic analysis of health issues and policies can provide well balanced orderings of the state of the economy. This paper provides an innovative framework for welfare economic analysis of the relationships between economic growth, health outcomes and social welfare for both a...

The Australian government will double its Official Development Assistance by 2015 (over 2010 levels). Innovative delivery mechanisms will be required to ensure aid is spent efficiently. In addition to traditional delivery mechanisms - bilateral, multilateral - the Australian government has...

Determining whether well-being has improved is an important multidisciplinary task. It is important therefore to develop a multidimensional measure of well-being that reflects a wide spectrum of human needs. A new approach is presented in this paper based on multidimensional hierarchical human...

Aid is an important resource for developing countries. Many small island states (including those in the Pacific) are highly reliant on aid to supplement meagre government resources and other foreign capital inflows. This paper investigates the conditional volatility of aid (for bilateral aid...

This paper looks at public sector debt in developing countries, being concerned specifically with the relationship between aid inflows and the public sector borrowing requirement net of aid loans. After examining the public sector budget constraint and various conditions under which aid might...