Frontiers in Behavioral Economics | New and Recent Articles

Out-of-pocket health care spending is an inefficient and inequitable financing mechanism, as it reduces household well-being and can push families into poverty. This study estimates the impoverishment associated with out-of-pocket health care expenditures in Peru between 2010 and 2021 and identifies the factors associated with such impoverishment. Using microdata from the National Household Surve…

Women's entrepreneurship is central to the functioning of agri-food systems in sub-Saharan Africa, yet women-owned enterprises remain constrained by socio-cultural, structural, and financial barriers. This study examines how open-market systems shape opportunities and constraints for women entrepreneurs in agri-food businesses in Thyolo and Chiradzulu districts of Malawi. Rather than assuming lin…

IntroductionThis study examined how Filipino university students prioritize sportswear attributes and whether these preferences vary across sociodemographic groups within the context of Physical Activity Towards Health and Fitness courses (PATH-Fit). Framed within behavioral economics, the study treats sportswear purchasing as a form of everyday consumer decision-making shaped by functional need,…

IntroductionThe post-COVID-19 phenomenon of “quiet quitting” could be problematic for UK economic growth because unpaid overtime has been a key contributor to business productivity since the 2008 global financial crisis. Here, we explore the extent to which this phenomenon exists in the UK, and whether the tendency for quiet quitting differs across generations.MethodsWe analyzed data from the UK …

IntroductionHuman-machine interactions become increasingly pervasive in daily life and professional contexts, motivating research to examine how human behavior changes when individuals interact with machines rather than other humans. While most of the existing literature focused on human-machine interactions with algorithmic systems in advisory roles, research on human behavior in monitoring or v…

This article presents a pragmatic framework for time-sensitive analysis of behavioral RCTs using sequence methods and Markov modeling. The focus is not methodological novelty but translation: we map common policy questions to appropriate temporal tools, provide a reporting checklist for transparency, and show how estimates become implementable rules for booster timing, triage, and exit. We positi…

The concept of “Ecohesion” offers a novel perspective on sustainable transitions by emphasizing social cohesion as a central element. Drawing inspiration from Herbert Gintis's combination of macro social dynamics and micro behavioral evidence, this framework integrates his theories on the interplay between social norms, endogenous preferences, and institutional dynamics. By identifying four funda…

Hospitality and consumer environments are undoubtedly multisensory, yet auditory stimuli remain underutilized as intentional components of choice architecture. This mini-review synthesizes evidence from psychology, neuroscience, and behavioral economics examining how soundscapes—particularly micro-auditory cues such as door clicks and elevator tones—are undervalued in their functions as behaviora…

We test for gender effects in the “vote with your wallet” game, a multi- person version of the prisoner's dilemma that models responsible consump- tion decisions. We find that women cooperate significantly more (have more responsible consumption decisions) than men in the baseline version of the game. This baseline excludes three additional elements tested in companion treatments: i) a legality f…

This paper aims to assess the impact of cultural heritage on Greek economic development. An input-output model approach is used to estimate a set of multipliers that measure the direct, indirect and induced (broader) macroeconomic impact of income, output, value added and employment of cultural heritage on economic growth. The multipliers of product, gross value added, income and employment are c…

In the wake of the Affordable Care Act's coverage expansions and the COVID-19 pandemic's urgent demand for remote services, telehealth has become a critical gateway to healthcare for underserved and access-challenged populations across the United States. While telehealth offers the potential to reduce barriers related to distance, transportation, and provider shortages, persistent disparities in …

Herbert Gintis's research cut to the heart of what scientists must probe in order to understand what kinds of economic arrangements are possible, and which of those arrangements have the potential to make possible human flourishing among the largest numbers of people. Early in his career, he recognized that economics' standard depiction of human actors constituted a barrier to serious research on…

IntroductionHuman cooperation persists among strangers in large, well-mixed populations despite theoretical predictions of difficulties, leaving a fundamental evolutionary puzzle. While upstream (pay it forward: helping others because you were helped) and downstream (rewarding reputation: helping those with good reputations) indirect reciprocity have been independently considered as solutions, th…

This paper tests the robustness of promise keeping in economic interactions using a laboratory experiment. Our design allows us to examine the roles of both social- and self-image concerns, and to investigate whether these concerns are diminished when participants are provided with responsibility-diffusing excuses. When the responsibility for a broken promise is undeniable, promise keeping is hig…

Communication is crucial to resolving conflicts such as social dilemmas. Previous literature concurs that communication among all group members increases cooperation. However, gathering all the members is often difficult. Hence, the effect of communication among some group members needs to be examined. The current study addressed this notion in a public goods experiment framework measuring the so…

Using a randomized field experiment, we provide evidence on how university students respond to interventions designed to encourage downloading and engaging with a mental health smartphone application (hereafter referred to as “app”). Our intervention targeted all students, both mentally healthy and unwell, and our sample was broadly representative (n = 1,812; women = 60%, men = 30%, non-binary/un…