In this paper we model a decision maker who must exert costly effort to complete a single task by a fixed deadline. Effort costs evolve stochastically in continuous time. The decision maker will then optimally wait to exert effort until costs are less than a given threshold, the solution to...

In this paper we model a decision maker who must exert costly effort to complete a single task by a fixed deadline. Effort costs evolve stochastically in continuous time. The decision maker will then optimally wait to exert effort until costs are less than a given threshold, the solution to an...

We study procrastination in the context of a field experiment involving students who must exert costly effort to complete certain tasks by a fixed deadline. Students display a strong demand for commitment in the form of self-imposed deadlines. However, deadlines appear not to increase task...

This paper provides a test of a theory of social learning through endogenous information acquisition. A group of subjects face a decision problem under uncertainty. Subjects are endowed with private information about the fundamentals of the problem and make decisions sequentially. The key...

In this paper, we experimentally investigate a social learning model with endogenous timing. Specifically, we focus on a model, in which two subjects are supposed to make a binary decision. One alternative is a safe action with a fixed payoff, while the other alternative is a risky action. The...

We study coalition formation in “real time”, a situation in which coalition formation is intertwined with the ongoing receipt of pay-offs. Agreements are assumed to be permanently binding: They can only be altered with the full consent of existing signatories. For characteristic function...