1,720,985 research outputs found
The Priced Survey Methodology
No full textIn this paper, I introduce a novel methodology to conduct surveys. The priced survey methodology. Like standard surveys, priced surveys are easy to implement, and measure invisible assets such as feelings, happiness, knowledge, views, and attitudes on numerical scales. Unlike standard surveys, priced surveys allow to leverage decades of research on revealed preference and consumer demand in the analysis of invisible assets
The Priced Survey Methodology: Theory
No full textIn this paper, I introduce a novel methodology to conduct surveys. The priced survey methodology (PSM). Like standard surveys, priced surveys are easy to implement, and measure social preferences on numerical scales. The PSM's design draws inspiration from consumption choice experiments, as respondents fill out the same survey several times under different choice sets. I extend Afriat's theorem and show that the Generalized Axiom of Revealed Preferences is necessary and sufficient for the existence of a concave, continuous, and single-peaked utility function rationalizing answers to the PSM. I apply the PSM to a sample of online participants and show that most respondents are rational when answering the PSM. I estimate respondents' single-peaked utility functions and draw several implications on their social preferences
Essais en économie politique et sur l'évolution des normes culturelles
No full textThe first chapter of this dissertation presents a theory of child development and parental rearingpractices. In the model, a benevolent parent seeks to transmit cultural norms to her child, whoacquires cognitive skills and develops a capital of appreciation for adopting behaviors that accordwith these norms. Our cultural perspective on the issue of cognitive development provides aninterpretation grid for various results established in the empirical literature. It also permits to identifythe parental characteristics that are conducive to various parenting styles, to child neglect and tochild maltreatment.The second chapter provides a theory of religious prohibition against usury and innovation and itsconsequences on economic activities and occupations. As an economic prohibition from themajority religion is sustained by a threat of social exclusion from that cultural group, it has lesseffects on religious minorities. It then creates an occupational pattern where only the religiousminorities choose activities that transgress the prohibition. By creating resentment against thereligious minorities, this occupational pattern strengthens the diffusion of the majority religion in thepopulation. An economic prohibition is then instigated by the clerics in the majority religion,because it allows them to consolidate their norms and to increase the scope of their control overpopular masses. This work also demonstrates that an economic prohibition lasts longer whenreligious clerics can legitimize secular rulers and when the competition on the religious market isweaker.In the last chapter, we present a microfounded theory of multi-candidate political competition takingan "industrial organization" perspective of politics. The analytical framework is shown to be exibleenough to address several applications on the topics of special interest politics, coalition formationin the legislature in proportional elections, and redistribution under alternative electoral rulesCette dissertation est composée de trois articles traitant de sujets divers. Le premier développe une théorie sur la transmission de normes culturelles. Le second article traite de l'évolution des doctrines religieuses dans une économie productive. Enfin, le dernier article de cette dissertation est un travail joint avec Thierry Verdier. L'article propose une nouvelle approche des élections impliquant un nombre arbitraire de candidats. Cette problématique de recherche est importante non seulement quant à sa complexité théorique, mais aussi parce qu'elle permet d'étudier relativement simplement la structure des marchés politiques.Le premier article présente une théorie sur le développement de l'enfant et les pratiques parentales. Dans le modèle, un parent cherche à transmettre des normes comportementales à son enfant en lui envoyant des signaux, que l'enfant observe de manière imparfaite. L'enfant peut cependant augmenter la qualité des signaux qu'il reçoit en investissant dans l'acquisition de compétences cognitives.Nous établissons que les styles parentaux autoritaires ou permissifs décroissent l'accumulation de compétences cognitives. De plus, puisque les interactions entre parents et enfants visent à transmettre des normes comportementales, l'enfant développe un capital d'appréciation pour le développement de compétences cognitives.Notre perspective culturelle sur la question du développement cognitif fournit une grille d'interprétation utile pour divers résultats établis dans la littérature empirique sur le développement de l'enfant.Le second article propose une théorie de la prohibition religieuse contre l'usure et l'innovation et ses conséquences sur les activités et les occupations économiques.Comme une interdiction économique provenant de la religion majoritaire est soutenue par un risque d'exclusion sociale de ce groupe culturel, elle a moins d'effets sur les minorités religieuses. Cela implique que seules les minorités religieuses choisissent des activités qui vont à l'encontre de la prohibition à l'équilibre.Dans le dernier article, nous présentons une théorie micro-fondée de la concurrence politique à plusieurs candidats prenant une perspective ``d'organisation industrielle" de la politique. Nous présentons d'abord un modèle de vote aléatoire qui utilise des distributions introduites par le mathématicien français Maurice Fréchet et qui portent son nom. Ces distributions permettent d'exprimer les parts de vote des différents candidats comme des ``contest functions'', ce qui permet d'établir un théorème d'existence et d'unicité d'un équilibre des stratégies politiques dans des élections impliquant un nombre arbitraire de candidats.Le cadre analytique s'avère suffisamment souple pour traiter plusieurs applications sur des thèmes liés à la structure endogène des marchés politiques. Nous montrons en particulier que le degré d'information des électeurs sur les plateformes ainsi que les campagnes médiatiques impliquent un degré de fragmentation politique plus faible
The Moral Mind(s) of Large Language Models Avner Seror
No full textAs large language models (LLMs) become integrated to decision-making across various sectors, a key question arises: do they exhibit an emergent "moral mind" -a consistent set of moral principles guiding their ethical judgments -and is this reasoning uniform or diverse across models? To investigate this, we presented about forty different models from the main providers with a large array of structured ethical scenarios, creating one of the largest datasets of its kind. Our rationality tests revealed that at least one model from each provider demonstrated behavior consistent with stable moral principles, effectively acting as approximately optimizing a utility function encoding ethical reasoning. We identified these utility functions and observed a notable clustering of models around neutral ethical stances. To investigate variability, we introduced a novel non-parametric permutation approach, revealing that the most rational models shared 59% to 76% of their ethical reasoning patterns. Despite this shared foundation, differences emerged: roughly half displayed greater moral adaptability, bridging diverse perspectives, while the remainder adhered to more rigid ethical structures
Child Development in Parent-Child Interactions
No full textInternational audienceI present a model of child development that highlights the effect of parent-child interactions on the formation of skills. Through the parent’s affection, the child learns and builds mental representations of the self as loved and competent. These mental representations shape the child’s noncognitive skills and foster learning. I show that this model provides a unifying explanation for well-established evidence on child development. The model also sheds light on how early exposure to media devices can negatively impact skill acquisition. I discuss implications for the design of policies to reduce inequalities in child development
Semi-Parametric Approach to Behavioral Biases
No full textThis paper shows how to recover behavioral biases from revealed preference ranking implied by choices. The approach formalizes and unifies known behavioral models, including salience thinking, inattention, and logarithmic perception, thereby accounting for many well-documented choice puzzles. I show that this approach provides a way to filter out choice data from behavioral biases explaining rationality breaches before fitting parametric utility models. The approach is applied to workhorse data sets of the literature on choice under risk and scanner consumer choices
Human Development, Social Interactions, and Identity Formation
No full text40 pagesThis paper presents a general theory of child development that incorporates interactive learning and identity formation in social interactions with caregivers. The model sheds light on many puzzling aspects of child development. Child learning responds nonmonotonically to caregivers' attention and approval in social interactions. I highlight key parental characteristics associated with child learning, and identity formation. The theory also explains why media devices widen human inequality. Lessons are finally drawn for the design of policies that alleviate human inequality
Semi-Parametric Approach to Behavioral Biases
No full textThis paper shows how to recover behavioral biases from revealed preference ranking implied by choices. The approach formalizes and unifies known behavioral models, including salience thinking, inattention, and logarithmic perception, thereby accounting for many well-documented choice puzzles. I show that this approach provides a way to filter out choice data from behavioral biases explaining rationality breaches before fitting parametric utility models. The approach is applied to workhorse data sets of the literature on choice under risk and scanner consumer choices
The Priced Survey Methodology: Theory
No full textIn this paper, I introduce a novel methodology to conduct surveys. The priced survey methodology (PSM). Like standard surveys, priced surveys are easy to implement, and measure social preferences on numerical scales. The PSM's design draws inspiration from consumption choice experiments, as respondents fill out the same survey several times under different choice sets. I extend Afriat's theorem and show that the Generalized Axiom of Revealed Preferences is necessary and sufficient for the existence of a concave, continuous, and single-peaked utility function rationalizing answers to the PSM. I apply the PSM to a sample of online participants and show that most respondents are rational when answering the PSM. I estimate respondents' single-peaked utility functions and draw several implications on their social preferences
The Moral Mind(s) of Large Language Models Avner Seror
No full textAs large language models (LLMs) become integrated to decision-making across various sectors, a key question arises: do they exhibit an emergent "moral mind" -a consistent set of moral principles guiding their ethical judgments -and is this reasoning uniform or diverse across models? To investigate this, we presented about forty different models from the main providers with a large array of structured ethical scenarios, creating one of the largest datasets of its kind. Our rationality tests revealed that at least one model from each provider demonstrated behavior consistent with stable moral principles, effectively acting as approximately optimizing a utility function encoding ethical reasoning. We identified these utility functions and observed a notable clustering of models around neutral ethical stances. To investigate variability, we introduced a novel non-parametric permutation approach, revealing that the most rational models shared 59% to 76% of their ethical reasoning patterns. Despite this shared foundation, differences emerged: roughly half displayed greater moral adaptability, bridging diverse perspectives, while the remainder adhered to more rigid ethical structures
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