In a search model, prospects encounter salespeople who can try to persuade them. Persuasive messages can increase the utility of buying or increase the cost of not buying. The latter reduces welfare. Equilibria where only some salespeople make a persuasive effort often exist. Salespeople vary in...

In the past decade, nearly 20 studies have found a strong, persistent pattern in surveys and behavioral experiments from over 40 countries: individual exposure to war violence tends to increase social cooperation at the local level, including community participation and prosocial behavior. Thus...

We examine peer effects in early education by estimating value added models with school fixed effects that control extensively for individual, family, peer, and teacher characteristics to account for the endogeneity of peer group formation. We find statistically significant and robust spillover...

This paper develops a model of social interactions with endogenous association. People are assumed to invest in relationships to maximize their utility. Even in a linear-in-means model, when associations are endogenous, the effect of macro-group composition on behavior is non-linear and varies...

This paper provides a systematic analysis of identification in linear social interactions models. This is both a theoretical and an econometric exercise as the analysis is linked to a rigorously delineated model of interdependent decisions. We develop an incomplete information game that...

This research provides the first support for a possible psychological universal: human beings around the world derive emotional benefits from using their financial resources to help others (prosocial spending). Analyzing survey data from 136 countries, we show that prosocial spending is...

What determines the intensity and objects of hatred? Hatred forms when people believe that out-groups are responsible for past and future crimes, but the reality of past crimes has little to do with the level of hatred. Instead, hatred is the result of an equilibrium where politicians supply...