This research explores how the experience of a jilt — the anticipation and subsequent inaccessibility of a highly desirable, aspirant option — influences preference for incumbent and non-incumbent options. We conceptualize jilting as a multi-stage process, which consists of a pre-jilt...

Do emotions affect the decision between change and the status quo? We exploit exogenous variation in emotions caused by rain and analyze data on more than 400 ballot propositions in Switzerland for the years 1958 to 2014 to address this question. The empirical tests are based on administrative...

People often fail to insure against catastrophes, even when insurance is subsidized. Even when insuring homes, many homeowners still underinsure the full value of their assets. Some researchers have suggested using long-term insurance contracts to reduce these insurance gaps. We examine...

In many instances, default nudges are proven to be strong drivers of behavior. However, a number of ethical concerns have been raised. Both, nudge success and ethical concerns, depend heavily on the features of the default nudge, with some of them being shared by defaults in all settings. We...

Do emotions affect the decision between change and the status quo? We exploit exogenous variation in emotions caused by rain and analyze data on more than 870,000 municipal vote outcomes in Switzerland to address this question. The empirical tests are based on administrative ballot outcomes and...