Behavioral economists maintain that addictions such as alcoholism, smoking and over-eating represent examples of present-bias in decision making that is fundamentally irrational. In this article, we develop a model of present bias and apparently hyperbolic discounting that is fully consistent...

Prion diseases have raised concerns in consumer’s minds about food safety associated with meat world-wide. Bovine Spongiform Encephalopathy (BSE) and Chronic Wasting Disease (CWD) both exist in Canada and consumer markets for beef, bison, elk and deer may have been affected by the diseases....

Facilitating healthy eating among young people, particularly among minorities who are at high risk for gaining excess weight, is at the forefront of current policy discussions and food program reviews. We investigate the effects of social interactions and relative prices on fruit and vegetable...

This study investigates whether peers are a contributing factor in childhood body-weight outcomes. Using an instrumental variables method on exogenously assigned peers, we find that the weight of peers within the same grade and school significantly impacts body mass index (BMI) z-score of an...

The IFAMR is published quarterly by the International Food and Agribusiness Management Association. www.ifama.org

Includes front cover and editorial information.

Paper for presentation at the Northeastern Agricultural & Resource Economics Association’s Workshop on Economics and Child Nutrition Programs, AAEA & NAREA Joint Annual Meeting, Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, July 23, 2011.

This paper investigates the effects of network based individual social capital on the access of rural households to services. In the context of development economics, an innovative data collection approach is used to determine network based social capital. The approach originates from the field...

While there is increasing interest in reducing obesity, relatively few of these efforts focus on rural communities. A multi-tiered model to reduce obesity risk factors was developed and implemented to change food behavior and health awareness in a rural West Texas community over a one year...