Economic Inquiry articles from January 2008

Economic Inquiry archives from January 2008

Introduction.(Brief article)
January 1, 2008... The papers published in this issue were presented at the 81st Annual Conference of the Western Economic Association held in San Diego, California, June 29-July 3, 2006. All were invited. All were subject to editorial review. Not all invited...

The role of noncognitive skills in explaining cognitive test scores.
January 1, 2008... I. INTRODUCTION This article reports findings of an experiment to examine whether measured cognitive test scores are influenced by noncognitive skills. The basic idea of our analysis is that the performance on a cognitive test not only...

After-school program effects on behavior: results from the 21st Century Community Learning Centers program national evaluation.
January 1, 2008... I. INTRODUCTION The number of after-school programs has grown rapidly in recent years, spurred by growing employment rates of mothers, pressure to increase academic achievement, and concerns about risks to children who are unsupervised...

Unpacking social interactions.
January 1, 2008... I. INTRODUCTION Following seminal contribution of Manski (1993) to the econometric literature on social interactions, as well as comprehensive treatment by Brock and Durlauf (2001), researchers have taken seriously the identification...

Understanding regression versus variance tests for social interactions.
January 1, 2008... I. INTRODUCTION This article is designed to understand the relationship between two approaches to the empirical analysis of social interactions. The first approach is the use of linear regressions to uncover social interactions. This...

Behavioral economics and drinking behavior: preliminary results from an Irish college study.
January 1, 2008... 1. INTRODUCTION This article provides an examination of alcohol consumption among a sample of students at an Irish university. We examine the role of key demographic factors such as gender, age, year in college, housing tenure, and...

An assessment of causal inference in smoking initiation research and a framework for future research.
January 1, 2008... I. INTRODUCTION The causal factors underlying youth smoking initiation are central to the challenge of developing effective smoking prevention programs and the shaping of many other types of smoking-related policies. These causal factors,...

Risk beliefs and smoking behavior.
January 1, 2008... I. INTRODUCTION More people die from smoking each year than from any other consumption activity. These risks arise from consumer choices in a market context. As a result, whether consumers are cognizant of the attendant hazards is a...

Why understanding smoking bans is important for estimating their effects: California's restaurant smoking bans and restaurant sales.
January 1, 2008... I. INTRODUCTION A voluminous literature has sought to quantify the effect of smoking bans, typically on the quantity of smoking, but also on the performance of affected businesses. (1) Various time periods have been explored, types of bans...

Is there reciprocity in a reciprocal-exchange economy? Evidence of gendered norms from a slum in Nairobi, Kenya.
January 1, 2008... I. INTRODUCTION Reciprocity is an internalized norm, inducing people to respond to kindness with kindness and to unkindness with unkindness even if it is not in their material interest to do so. It helps explain why people respond to...

Representative trust and reciprocity: prevalence and determinants.(Survey)
January 1, 2008... I. INTRODUCTION Numerous experiments show that in certain situations people are willing to trust, that is, make themselves vulnerable to exploitation by opportunistic individuals (for a survey, see Camerer 2003). Another large body of...