Paternal incarceration and child-reported behavioral functioning at age 9

Within the last few decades our understanding of the importance of non-cognitive skills for socioeconomic success has grown along with our knowledge of the deleterious impacts of paternal incarceration for child wellbeing. Given the importance of early skills and that elementary-aged children constitute the majority of children with incarcerated parents, understanding the connection between paternal incarceration and the socio-emotional component of children’s non-cognitive development is pressing. Using matching models, data from the newest wave of the Fragile Families and Child Wellbeing Study, and exploring a larger range of behavioral skills than previous literature, this paper provides estimates of the impact of paternal incarceration on children’s behavioral functioning at age 9 using children’s own self-reports. Comparisons to oft-used parent reports are made and heterogeneity by gender is explored. Findings suggest the incarceration of a father increases the antisocial behaviors children self-report, but has null effects on prosocial skill development.     

Ex-post blindness as excuse? The effect of information disclosure on giving

People passing by beggars without leaving a penny are not necessarily pure money-maximizers. In the world of sincere and dishonest recipients, some donors might anticipate the disutility they will suffer at the moment they realize their help is misdirected and reduce their willingness to donate to avoid these psychological costs. I employ a dictator game with ex-ante uncertainty about recipient’s endowment and requests from recipients to study how donors react to ex-post revelation of recipient’s type. I observe no difference in donations with and without ex-post information about recipient’s endowment. However, if donors could choose if they want to receive such information themselves, nearly a third of dictators choose to remain ignorant. Those dictators who choose to ex-post reveal the endowment of the recipient give significantly more.     

Greed and adolescent financial behavior

Financial problems in adolescents have increased over the last decades. We investigated if individual differences in greed relate to financial behavior. Greed is an important motive for economic behavior and refers to the tendency to never be satisfied and to always want more. We developed a short version of the Dispositional Greed Scale (Seuntjens, Zeelenberg, Van de Ven, & Breugelmans, 2015), which we then used in a large survey with adolescents (N = 3899). Dispositional greed is associated with them having more income, spending more, saving less often, and having debt more often. Identifying what personality characteristics influence financial behavior at a young age is important, as the financial habits that people learn during adolescence persist in adulthood. We find that greed has both positive effects (having a higher income), but also negative effects with the greedy being less likely to save and being more likely to have a debt.     

Implementing solutions to barriers to on-site HIV testing in substance abuse treatment: A tale of three facilities

Due to the scarcity of resources for implementing rapid onsite HIV testing, many substance abuse treatment programs do not offer these services. This study sought to determine whether addressing previously identified implementation barriers to integrating on-site rapid HIV testing into the treatment admissions process would increase offer and acceptance rates. Results indicate that it is feasible to integrate rapid HIV testing into existing treatment programs for substance abusers when resources are provided. Addressing barriers such as providing start-up costs for HIV testing, staff training, addressing staffing needs to reduce competing job responsibilities, and helping treatment staff members overcome their concerns about clients’ reactions to positive test results is paramount for the integration and maintenance of such programs.     

Exploring the underpinnings of impaired strategic decision-making under stress

The present study sought to examine the underpinnings of impaired strategic decision-making under stress. In contrast to previous laboratory-based research, we conducted a quasi-experiment in a real life stress situation. Specifically, we used the beauty contest game and compared the performance of a group of participants who were exposed to a real-life stressor (waiting to attend an exam at a university class) with a control group of participants who were not exposed to stress (waiting to attend a regular lecture at a university class). Furthermore, about half of the participants were instructed to write down what they believed another participant had assumed the average number in the beauty contest game to be and which target number she (or he) had chosen accordingly. The results showed that stress impaired strategic reasoning in the beauty contest game. Importantly, even when only including participants who understood the rules of the game in the analyses, stress still increased the numbers chosen in the beauty contest. Furthermore, we found that participants in the stress condition were significantly less likely to base their chosen number on their belief about other players’ choices. Hence, stress not only impairs understanding of the math behind the beauty contest game but also the degree of strategizing per se.     

Exploiting one’s power with a guilty conscience: An experimental investigation of self-serving biases

In our experimental investigation powerful managers use their discretion power to their own advantage and admit that their behavior is unfair. This contradicts studies stressing self-serving biases. Self-serving biases are often identified by asking people what fairness standards apply in situations with alternative income distributions. Nevertheless, when the response to a question is connected with a distributional decision, only the reply, but not necessarily the fairness standard, is biased. Social preference models envisage decisions as a compromise between self-interest and social concerns (norms). A model-based estimation of social concerns, as provided by this paper, is capable of identifying different sorts of self-serving biases. Higher income triggers higher fairness scores, but there are no indications that a relatively higher income compared to the peers is generally perceived as fairer than a relatively lower income.     

Balancing the balance: Self-control mechanisms and compulsive buying

Previous research has mainly focused on identifying why compulsive buyers engage in excessive buying, while their attempts to control problematic buying behavior have largely been ignored. The present research examines the self-control attempts of compulsive buyers. Study 1 uses qualitative in-depth interviews to provide initial insights into the self-control attempts of compulsive buyers. Study 2 adopts a quantitative survey approach, and examines how prudent and compulsive buyers differ in their self-control attempts. The studies demonstrate that compulsive buyers engage in self-control, but differ from prudent buyers in how they apply self-control measures. These differences have implications for interventions that aim to enhance the success of compulsive buyers’ self-control.     

Who’s adopting the smarter lunchroom approach? Individual characteristics of innovative food service directors

School cafeterias and, subsequently, food service directors (FSDs) play a vital role in feeding children in the U.S. This study investigates which FSDs with different characteristics and organizational affiliations are most willing to embrace and implement new programs in their cafeterias.In 2014 we surveyed a representative sample of 8143 school FSDs across the U.S. regarding their knowledge and use of innovative methods that encourage children to select healthy food options. Nearly all of the surveyed FSDs (93%) are aware of behavioral strategies to promote healthier eating in school lunchrooms, and nearly 93% report having made at least one change in their lunchroom. Male FSDs are more likely to be aware of new programs, though they are less likely to adopt them relative to female FSDs. In addition, membership in a professional organization increases awareness as well as the number of changes made by 0.14 (p < 0.01). Finally, 22% of all respondents say they know about the Smarter Lunchrooms approach, a set of research-based lunchroom behavioral strategies that positively influence children to select healthy foods.The findings highlight the importance of participation in professional associations which provide career-building activities for school FSDs increasing awareness and adoption of innovative approaches to motivate children to eat the nutritious foods. Given these findings, there is reason for policy makers and school districts to consider allocating funds to encourage FSDs to engage more fully in professional association meetings and activities.     

Resource Dependence Patterns and Organizational Behavior/Structure in Korean Nonprofit Organizations

This article examines the relationships among the three dimensions of resource dependence patterns (RDPs) and organizational formalization and goals in nonprofit organizations (NPOs). These three RDPs (that is, the appearance of the financial resource inflow) are resource dependency, resource diversity, and resource competitiveness. The empirical findings suggest that high dependency on government funding (high resource dependency) is positively associated with organizational formalization, although resource diversity does not have any explanatory power on organizational behavior and structure, and that a very competitive environment for resource acquisition significantly affects goal setting in NPOs. In particular, resource competitiveness well explains goal clarity and goal change in NPOs. NPOs with high resource competitiveness present clearer organizational goals or missions and are likely to experience frequent goal change.