This paper contributes to the literature on public health communication by studying how the framing of a message relaying the forecast impact of COVID-19 prevention measures affects compliance behaviour amongst both the young and old. A representative sample of survey respondents in the UK and...

We explore how social network exposure to COVID-19 cases shapes individuals’ social distancing behavior during the early months of the ongoing pandemic. We work with de-identified data from Facebook to show that U.S. users whose friends live in areas with worse coronavirus outbreaks reduce...

We analyze boundedly rational learning in social networks within binary action environments. We establish how learning outcomes depend on the environment (i.e., informational structure, utility function), the axioms imposed on the updating behavior, and the network structure. In particular, we...

We study a sequential-learning model featuring a network of naive agents with Gaussian information structures. Agents apply a heuristic rule to aggregate predecessors' actions. They weigh these actions according the strengths of their social connections to different predecessors. We show this...

I develop a theory of intermediation in a market where agents meet bilaterally to trade and buyers cannot commit to payments. Some agents observe the past trading history of traders in the market. These informed agents can secure trades by punishing traders who previously defaulted. The...

We explore how information exposure, specifically information transmission within organizations, facilitates companies' roles as corporate citizens. We study whether US firms' business networks with China and Italy become their information advantage, and examine whether firms use relevant...

We analyze a model of endogenous two-sided network formation where players are affected by uncertainty in their opponents' decisions. We model this uncertainty using the notion of equilibrium under ambiguity (Eichberger and Kelsey, 2014). Unlike the set of Nash equilibria, the set of equilibria...

In markets with search frictions, consumers can acquire information about goods either through costly search or from friends via word-of-mouth (WOM) communication. How do sellers' market power react to a very large increase in the number of consumers' friends with whom they engage in WOM? The...

Consumers can acquire information through their own search efforts or through their social network. Information diffusion via word-of-mouth communication leads to some consumers free-riding on their 'friends' and less information acquisition via active search. Free-riding also has an important...

We study a model of social learning in networks where the dynamics of beliefs are driven by conversations of dissonance-minimizing agents. Given their current beliefs, agents make statements, tune them to the statements of their associates, and then revise their beliefs. We characterize the...