Universität Wien
Warning! The directory is not yet complete and will be amended until the beginning of the term.

040288 SE Applied Behavioral Economics (MA) (2017W)

8.00 ECTS (4.00 SWS), SPL 4 - Wirtschaftswissenschaften
Continuous assessment of course work
Moodle

Registration/Deregistration

Note: The time of your registration within the registration period has no effect on the allocation of places (no first come, first served).

Details

max. 16 participants
Language: English

Lecturers

Classes (iCal) - next class is marked with N

PRELIMINARIES (3/10)
• Presentation of seminar structure, examination criteria
• Task in preparation of class 1: if not already done so, read the references in the reading list

CLASS 1 – INTRODUCTION TO (APPLIED) BEHAVIORAL ECONOMICS (17/10)
• Basic behavioral findings (rationality, heuristics and biases etc.)
• Status quo and current research trends, publication bias
• Applied research, practical implementation: field experiments

CLASS 2 – EXPERIMENTAL ECONOMICS AND RESEARCH DESIGNS (24/10)
• Identification, causality
• Basic experimental designs
• Typical experimental issues
• Specific issues related to outside-the-lab experiments

CLASS 3 – INTRODUCTION OF TOPICS BY PRACTITIONERS (31/10)
• Practitioners introduce their topics
• Based on topic-wise preferences students self-sort into groups of 2-3
• The main forum of interaction will be moodle
• Task in preparation of class 4: develop a detailed working schedule

CLASS 4 – PRACTITIONER PRESENTS TOPICS (14/11)
• Task in preparation of class 5: Literature review on the chosen topic
• draft working schedule

CLASS 5 –PRESENTATION AND DISCUSSION OF THE TOPICAL STATE OF THE FIELD, INCL. WORKING SCHEDULE (21/11)
• Short presentation of the literature review and the potential remedies to the problems at stake
• Public discussion of the working schedules (one per group)
• Tasks in preparation of class 6:
o Selecting an action proposal and preparing it in full detail
o Developing an experimental design to test the effectiveness of the proposed interventions

CLASS 6 – PRESENTATION OF THE STATUS QUO (12/12)
• Public discussion of the detailed proposals
• Detailed feedback to the action proposals and the experimental designs

CLASS 7 – PRESENTATION OF THE FINAL CONCEPT (9/1)
• Presentation of the fully developed action proposal including experimental design
• Detailed public discussion of all proposals

CLASS 8 – PRESENTATION TO PRACTITIONERS (23/1)
• Action proposals are presented to practitioners, active discussion
• The best proposals might be invited to be pursued in a Master thesis (with practitioners as partners).

  • Tuesday 03.10. 09:45 - 11:15 Seminarraum 3 Oskar-Morgenstern-Platz 1 1.Stock
  • Tuesday 17.10. 09:45 - 13:00 Seminarraum 3 Oskar-Morgenstern-Platz 1 1.Stock
  • Tuesday 24.10. 15:00 - 18:15 Seminarraum 5 Oskar-Morgenstern-Platz 1 1.Stock
  • Tuesday 31.10. 09:45 - 13:00 Seminarraum 3 Oskar-Morgenstern-Platz 1 1.Stock
  • Tuesday 14.11. 09:45 - 13:00 Seminarraum 4 Oskar-Morgenstern-Platz 1 1.Stock
  • Tuesday 21.11. 15:00 - 16:30 Seminarraum 5 Oskar-Morgenstern-Platz 1 1.Stock
  • Tuesday 12.12. 09:45 - 11:15 Seminarraum 6 Oskar-Morgenstern-Platz 1 1.Stock
  • Tuesday 09.01. 09:45 - 13:00 Seminarraum 3 Oskar-Morgenstern-Platz 1 1.Stock
  • Tuesday 23.01. 09:45 - 13:00 Seminarraum 6 Oskar-Morgenstern-Platz 1 1.Stock

Information

Aims, contents and method of the course

This seminar is a research guided and highly applied course. It builds on recent research findings in behavioral and experimental economics and guides students to applying these insights to current real life issues as laid out by policy makers, public officials and business professionals. These practitioners will present a set of ‘current issues’ they would like to find a behavioral remedy for. Students analyze the specific problems at stake, develop appropriate behavioral interventions to (potentially) achieve the practitioners’ goals and propose a research design to test the effectiveness of the suggested interventions.

AIMS
After completing the seminar students are able to use basic behavioral insights to remedy real life practical issues. In particular, they are capable of
• Analyzing the underlying behavioral mechanisms of practitioners’ real life issues
• Developing appropriate behavioral remedies (e.g. nudges)
• Designing an economic experiment to test the effectiveness of the proposed remedies

Assessment and permitted materials

• Presence and active participation (20%)
• Action proposal and working schedule (10%)
• Seminar paper and executive summary (40%)
• Oral presentation of the solution concept (30%)

Minimum requirements and assessment criteria

To pass this seminar, students need to achieve at least 50% in each of the four assessment criteria. In addition, students must be present for the full duration of class 4 (14/11) and 8 (23/1).

SPECIFIC CRITERIA FOR THE EVALUATION OF ACTION PROPOSALS
The developed action proposals (for details about the structure of the seminar see “further information) should contain the following in sufficient detail
• Clear description of the issue in question
• Review of the academic literature relevant for the chosen topic
• Selection and detailed justification of the most promising action proposal
• Outline of an economic experiment to test the effectiveness of the suggested measure

Examination topics

The specific topics will be introduced by the practitioners in class 4 (14/11).

Reading list

Students are expected to have a good understanding of basic behavioral economic insights and ideally have experience in the use of experimental methods before taking this course. In order to benefit from (and pass) the course, students are expected to having read the references on the reading list before the appropriate course unit.

The list of references will be provided in the first unit on October 3rd and can be found in moodle.

Association in the course directory

Last modified: Mo 07.09.2020 15:29