Ada Kovaliukaite, fourth-year experimental economics PhD student, and Mackenzie Alston, third-year experimental economics PhD student, were selected to participate in the 2016 Barcelona Graduate School of Economics’ (GSE) Summer Forum in Barcelona, Spain.
The Barcelona GSE forum took place from June 6 – 21, 2016, and was attended by students from all over the world. Participants received extensive training and experience in macroeconomic and collaborated with peers on group projects.
Catherine Eckel, Sarah and John Lindsey Professor in the Liberal Arts and University Distinguished Professor in the Department of Economics at Texas A&M University, gave several talks at Australian National University (ANU) in Canberra, Australia, during July 2016.
Dr. Eckel gave an F.H. Gruen Public Lecture on “Shopping for Trust” on July 19, 2016. In contrast to most research on trust, in this study (joint with Rick Wilson) Dr. Eckel uses lab experiments to show that choosing a partner substantially increases trust and reciprocity in an incentivized trust game. Partner choice is based on viewing the photographs of potential counterparts, and trusters are able to select counterparts who are more trustworthy. That is, potential partners that appear to be honest and trustworthy prove to reciprocate larger amounts in the trust game.
She also gave two talks to ANU’s Gender Institute on July 20, 2016 (pictured below). These consisted of a talk on mentoring female graduate students and junior faculty, and another one on lab experimental research on gender differences in financial market behavior.
Haley Harwell, a fifth-year experimental economics doctoral student, has been featured in the Graduate and Professional Student Council’s (GPSC) Research Spotlight.
To view the full feature, please go to: http://www.gpsctamu.org/research-spotlight.html.
On Friday, April 1, 2016, Dr. Pamela Matthews, dean of the College of Liberal Arts, visited the TAMU experimental economics group (including the Behavioral Economics and Policy Program, BEPP, and the Economic Research Laboratory, ERL). This was her first meeting with the experimental economics group.
Dean Matthews met with faculty, graduate students, undergraduate students, and student workers. Discussion included what projects the group was working on as well as future goals. Dean Matthews also had the opportunity to tour the facilities and participate in an ERL experiment.
Wei Zhan, a fourth-year experimental economics PhD student, has won the 2016 Fasken Teaching Award. The annual award is given to one doctoral student who demonstrates excellence in teaching and has a strong portfolio.
Congratulations, Wei!
From March 12 – 13, 2016, members of the TAMU experimental economics group presented at and attended the 2016 TExAS Conference at Rice University in Houston, TX.
Presenters this year included:
In addition to the presenters, a number of other PhD students and TAMU faculty members also attended.
The TExAS Conference was founded in 2014 by Dr. Brown, director of the ERL, as a way for experimentalists in Texas to collaborate with and learn from each other.
From January 5 – 9, 2016, the 21st Visiting Graduate Student Workshop in Experimental Economics was held at Chapman University. Sponsored by IFREE since 1997, the purpose of this workshop is to provide an introduction to laboratory methods in economics for PhD students.
Billur Aksoy and Mackenzie Alston, students of the PhD Program at Texas A&M, Department of Economics, participated in this workshop and interacted with Dr. Vernon Smith.
Daniel Fragiadakis and Daniel Stephenson traveled to Austin, Texas, to present research at the fourth Texas Economic Theory Camp held at the University of Texas at Austin from November 14 – 15, 2015. The purpose of the camp is to foster greater interaction among researchers working in pure and applied economic theory in Texas as well as to provide a forum for scholars to present their current research.
Daniel Stephenson presented his paper “Coordination and Evolutionary Stability in Attacker- Defender Games.” This study investigates the empirical validity of dynamic evolutionary models in continuous-time laboratory experiments with attacker-defender games.
This research studied two treatments: control and coordinated. Consistent with the theory, behavior is tightly clustered around the equilibrium in the control treatment. In the coordinated treatment, however, there are large cyclical deviations from the Nash Equilibrium. These results suggest that coordination incentives can lead to more predictable attacks in attacker-defender games.
Faculty and PhD students of Texas A&M’s Department of Economics presented their research at the Economics Science Association (ESA) North American meeting in Dallas, Texas. The conference draws some of the most important researchers in economic science. This year’s plenary speaker was Iris Bohnet.
The presenters and research topics during the conference were (in session order):
On Thursday, October 22, 2015, a workshop was held in honor of Dr. John Van Huyck at Southern Methodist University (SMU) in Dallas, TX. Dr. Van Huyck passed away in 2014.
More than 60 people from all over the country were in attendance. Larry Samuelson of Yale University delivered the plenary address on “The State of Game Theory.” The program consisted of 12 papers and the presenters included many of Dr. Van Huyck’s friends, colleagues, and students. Two of the papers listed Dr. Van Huyck as a coauthor.
The conference was organized by Catherine Eckel of Texas A&M University and Yan Chen of the University of Michigan. They extend a special thank you to Mr. Al Van Huyck, the father of Dr. Van Huyck, for sponsoring the event. Thanks also to the 12 presenters and to Tim Salmon of SMU for his assistance.
The program is here [wp-svg-icons icon=”file-pdf” wrap=”i”]
For more details on Dr. Van Huyck, please click here.