In this paper, I use an incentivized, nationwide, online experiment to isolate how individual donation preferences respond to the allocation of donations across different accounts within a charity (activity and overhead). I develop and structurally estimate (using a minimum-distance estimator) a donor-utility model to rationalize the experimental findings.
In this paper, we use an incentivized, nationwide, online experiment to elicit individual donation schedules across a range of overhead allocation rates. We then use a coordination game to study how individuals with different overhead preferences contribute toward meeting a group-level overhead threshold.
In this paper, we use a laboratory experiment and a modified ultimatum game to study how individuals respond to structural inequality faced by others. We examine whether they attempt to address such inequality and whether they resort to dishonest behavior to do so. We also test whether disadvantaged individuals are more likely to condone such behavior when it benefits them.
with Linda Thunstrom, Collin DePaemelere, and Klaas van 't Veld
In this paper, we use an incentivized, nationwide survey to elicit personal and perceived social norms around risky driving decisions and to collect data on individual driving behavior. We examine whether behavior responds to perceived norms and whether there is a gap between perceived social norms and true social norms, measured as the average of personal norms. We also explore how these patterns vary across age and gender groups.
Specht, A., Paul, S., and McWhorter, D. (2025). Losing Out by Winning the Prize: The Winner’s Curse and Competition for Political Privilege. In Applied Behavioral Economics: Theory, Method, and Practice for Driving Decisions (pp. 237-262). Nova Science Publishers, Inc. DOI: https://doi.org/10.52305/CZRL5358
Gebben, A., and Paul, S. Nuclear Waste Management: Institutional Friction Under Federalism. Under review at Energy Policy. [click here]
UW-CSU Student Research Seminar, 2026
Western Economic Association International, 2025
Economic Science Association North America Meeting, 2024
Western Economic Association International, 2024
UW-CSU Student Research Seminar, 2023