Morality as a Verb: The Process of Moral Development Within the “Family Culture”

The purpose of this paper was to examine many different theories of moral development, view their similarities and differences, and expand upon the role of the family in teaching morality. There have been many stage theories developed in order to understand the process of moral development. In addition, many researchers have criticized the stage models for not adequately incorporating the role of culture in shaping a child's moral stance. We believe that the child's family (not necessarily an American Western view of the family) is crucial in directly and indirectly translating cultural values to children. We review some prominent stage theories to moral development as a point of departure for looking at the crucial role of the family culture. The family teaches morality to children by finding a balance between the forces of individuation and connection.     

Satisfaction with Social Contacts of Older Europeans

This paper analyses the determinants of an important component of well-being among individuals aged 50 years or older in eleven European countries: satisfaction with social contacts. We use data from the Survey of Health, Ageing and Retirement in Europe and anchoring vignettes to correct for potential differences in responses scales across countries and socio-demographic groups. On average, older Europeans report being satisfied with their social contacts, but there exist substantial differences across countries: respondents from Northern countries tend to be more satisfied than individuals from Central or Mediterranean countries. Our analysis shows that correcting for response scale differentials alters the country ranking for of satisfaction with social contacts, while it has much less effect on the estimates of what drives within country determinants.     

Satisfaction with Job and Income Among Older Individuals Across European Countries

Using data on individuals of age 50 and older from 11 European countries, we analyze two economic aspects of subjective well-being of older Europeans: satisfaction with household income, and job satisfaction. Both have been shown to contribute substantially to overall well-being (satisfaction with life or happiness). We use anchoring vignettes to correct for potential differences in response scales across countries. The results highlight a large variation in self-reported income satisfaction, which is partly explained by differences in response scales. When differences in response scales are eliminated, the cross-country differences are quite well in line with differences in an objective measure of purchasing power of household income. There are common features in the response scale differences in job satisfaction and income satisfaction. French respondents tend to be critical in both assessments, while Danish and Dutch respondents are always on the optimistic end of the spectrum. Moreover, correcting for response scale differences decreases the cross-country association between satisfaction with income and job satisfaction among workers.     

Measuring Inequity Aversion in a Heterogeneous Population Using Experimental Decisions and Subjective Probabilities

We combine choice data in the ultimatum game with the expectations of proposers elicited by subjective probability questions to estimate a structural model of decision making under uncertainty. The model, estimated using a large representative sample of subjects from the Dutch population, allows both nonlinear preferences for equity and expectations to vary across socioeconomic groups. Our results indicate that inequity aversion to one's own disadvantage is an increasing and concave function of the payoff difference. We also find considerable heterogeneity in the population. Young and highly educated subjects have lower aversion for inequity than other groups. Moreover, the model that uses subjective data on expectations generates much better in‐ and out‐of‐sample predictions than a model which assumes that players have rational expectations.     

The Schwarzian derivative as a ranking of downside risk aversion

It is observed that the measure S _u  = u′′′/u′ − (3/2)(u′′/u′)², previously shown to be a relevant measure of the degree of downside risk aversion, is known in the mathematics literature as the Schwarzian derivative. The Schwarzian derivative has invariance properties under composition of functions that make it particularly well-behaved as a ranking of downside risk aversion. Indeed, it has the same invariance properties as the measure R _u  = −u′′/u′, familiar to economists as a ranking of utility functions by degree of Arrow-Pratt risk aversion.