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Distorted judgments of the value of possessions are believed to drive excessive acquisition and difficulty discarding in hoarding. Aberrant valuation in hoarding disorder may manifest in an exaggerated endowment effect. We tested this supposition in two studies, using between- (Study 1) and within- (Study 2) subjects designs. We used nonparametric 2x2 ANOVA to contrast the strength of the endowment effect between healthy individuals and those with hoarding disorder. We also used quantile regression analysis to examine the relation between severity of hoarding symptoms and the endowment effect. The data did not reveal an elevated endowment effect among participants with hoarding disorder in either study. However, in both studies self-reported difficulty discarding, the hallmark feature of hoarding, as well as severity of overall hoarding symptoms, positively correlated with between-subject variations in the endowment effect. Symptom improvement following cognitive-behavioral therapy for hoarding did not correspond to a decrease in the endowment effect, potentially indicating a dissociation between hoarding severity and the endowment effect over the course of treatment. Overall, our results suggest the potential value in further study of the endowment effect in hoarding, particularly its trait versus state features and modifiability.

Young adulthood is a time of dramatic change in both body and behavior, increasingly complex and nuanced social networks, maturing capacity for intimacy, intensification of pre-existing friendships, increasing separation from the family of origin, and formation of new relationships. Most teenagers successfully navigate the transition from dependence to self-sufficiency, but this process sometimes goes awry. This is the most common age for the onset of major psychiatric disorders; new onset of major psychopathology after age 25 is unusual. Understanding which young adults require support, when to intervene, and how to intervene to promote well-being and mitigate illness trajectories is a key focus of resilience research. We posit that well-being and illness trajectories, and how they influence and are influenced by social experiences, are not uniform; they are modulated by individual traits, such as temperament. For instance, individuals with persistent hypomanic traits (HPM) are face unique challenges in developing quality relationships, since they paradoxically possess both pro-social and anti-social traits. HPM is associated both with elevated risk for psychopathology and with creativity and various socially beneficial outcomes, such as entrepreneurship (as we have shown in recent work). Social connectedness appears to mitigate risk for psychopathology and enhance the likelihood of socially beneficial outcomes in HPM. How and why hypomanic tendencies interact with social and neurobiological maturation in determining health and well-being trajectories remains unclear. We propose to address this knowledge gap in a longitudinal study of students at Yale and Southern Connecticut State Universities (4-year programs), students at Gateway Community College (2-year program), and youth not enrolled in college. This diverse sample will increase the generalizability of our results. We hypothesize dynamic bidirectional interactions between HPM traits, life situations, and the development of social connectedness during young adulthood. We also hypothesize that these dynamic interactions during young adulthood are shaped by, and may in turn influence, the maturation of prefrontal-limbic circuits that support emotion regulation and cognitive-emotional integration. We will collect self-report, behavioral, social network, and neuroimaging data; we will analyze these data using (unbalanced) panel data analysis and structural equation modeling of psychometric and clinical instruments, quantitative mapping of augmented egocentric social networks, and behavior-based measures of trust and trustworthiness. We will use functional neuroimaging to characterize functioning of circuits involved in emotion regulation and cognitive-emotional integration and longitudinally test their bidirectional interaction with social and psychological measures over the course of young adulthood. Our novel approach will characterize individuals who may later develop psychopathology but who are not help-seeking in early adulthood. This creates potential for developing predictive biomarkers that are more generalizable than those derived from studies focused only on help-seeking youth. Future studies may apply this approach to other at-risk groups, such as individuals with elevated anhedonia.

In the US, The Tobacco Transition Payment Program, also called the "tobacco buy-out," helps tobacco quota holders and producers transition to the free market. In China, the transaction of Land Use Rights providing farmers’ ability to buy or sell Land Use Rights has been seriously considered by the Chinese government. The uncertainty in household income and changes in economic environment during the US Tobacco Transition Payment Program and the Chinese Land Use Rights Regime lead many individuals into entrepreneurial activities. Entrepreneurship often means making changes in livelihood activities that involve substantial risks to income. While the rewards may be substantial, transactions costs may make decisions irreversible. This paper draws a comparison between entrepreneurship and technology adoption. Adopting a new production technology also involves substantial risks. The economics of technology adoption is a well developed literature with many accepted and testable models. Most prominent are the theories of learning by using and learning by doing. We review the technology adoption literature, drawing out lessons for entrepreneurship research. We then apply an ‘entrepreneurship as technology adoption’ model to a unique dataset collected in Kentucky, US and in Shaanxi province, China. Using a sample of 702 Kentucky farmers at the time of the buyout and 730 Chinese farmers, we test several of the implications of this model and compare significant results between Kentucky and Shaanxi farmers. This study finds that both farmers in Kentucky and Shaanxi with a strong social network are more likely to become entrepreneurs. Kentucky farmers with low income are more likely to start new businesses. The finding supports the “push” hypothesis as farmers with low income are pushed into starting a new business. The human capital factor is strongly associated with Shaanxi farmer’s entrepreneurial decision.

Entrepreneurship means making discrete changes in livelihood activities that involve substantial risks to income. While the rewards may be substantial, transactions costs may make decisions irreversible. This paper draws a comparison between entrepreneurship and technology adoption. Adopting a new production technology also involves substantial risks. The economics of technology adoption is a well developed literature with many accepted and testable models. Most prominent are the theories of learning by using and learning by doing. We review the technology adoption literature, drawing out lessons for entrepreneurship research. We then apply an entrepreneurship as technology adoption model to a unique dataset collected during the tobacco buyout. The uncertainty in household income and changes in economic environment during the tobacco transition payment program lead many individuals into entrepreneurial activities.

This article analyzes factors that affected the decision to exit tobacco production in the wake of the tobacco buyout program using the data collected through a survey of Kentucky tobacco farmers. Using the Heuristic logistic regression model, we find that the decision to exit tobacco growing was affected by efficiency considerations, availability of off-farm employment, and exit barriers. Availability of off-farm employment had the strongest effect on farmers younger than 46, while the effect of variables measuring efficiency and exit barriers seemed to be more uniform across age groups. Based on the results we suggest several policy interventions.

Our study uses the data collected during the implementation of the tobacco buyout program in Kentucky to evaluate how rural households, diverse in income, age, family structure, location, education level, and other characteristics, made a choice between annuities and a lump-sum payment. Subjects in our field experiment did not have to retire or change their employment, as did subjects in many field studies of the choice between annuities and lump-sum payments, which allowed us to evaluate the relationship between the option choice and a decision whether to exit the tobacco market. Our results suggest that while discounted utility theory gives acceptable predictions of the farmers’ behavior, other factors have to be taken into consideration. First, there are consistent biases that describe individual intertemporal behavior, such as availability bias or acquiescence bias. Second, there is a certain degree of heterogeneity in individual intertemporal preferences that correlates with their personal characteristics, such as education and production status. Third, our analysis revealed that the decision to exit the tobacco market positively correlated with the decision to take a lump-sum payment.

There are many expenditure options available to farmers who received a tobacco buyout check. A multinomial probit model is used to analyze how farmer, business, and household characteristics influence the choice of expenditure option. Results of the study show that farmers tend to use the tobacco buyout payments as a special income account which they spend in a focused manner, and their expenditure choices vary by gender and by age groups. Findings also reveal that farmers who plan to stay in tobacco production are more likely to invest in new or existing on-farm activities.

There are many expenditure options available to farmers who received a tobacco buyout check. We used a multinomial logit model to analyze how farmer, business, and household characteristics influenced the choice of expenditure option. We found statistically significant differences in the way farmers chose to spend their buyout money based on age, education, gender, and internet use. We also found that farmer optimism had a statistically significant impact on expenditure choice. Overall, our analysis suggests that it is important for policymakers to take into account this heterogeneity instead of treating all farmers as a homogeneous group of representative agents.

Three theoretical non-point water pollution control schemes were tested repeatedly in experimental studies tax-subsidy scheme (K. Segerson, 1988), collective fining (Xepapadeas, 1991) and random fining (Xepapadeas, 1991). Camacho and Requate (2004) summarized results reported by Spraggon (2002), Vossler et al (2002), Cochard et al (2002), and Alpizar et al (2004) and replicated their experiments. In this paper I will discuss similarity and differences among all the reported results and in particular the following two. First, both collective fining and random fining induce abatement under the target, their performance deteriorates over time, and is relatively consistent over the replications. Second, tax-subsidy scheme induced abatement over the target, its performance is consistent over time, but not over the replications. Three different theories offer an explanation of how individuals behave as members of a group: non-cooperative game theory (individuals choose to maximize their individual profits), cooperative game theory (individuals within a group choose a coalition that would maximize profit of each member of the coalition), evolutionary game theory (individuals choose to maximize their relative profits difference between individual profit and average profit in the group). Each of these theories suggests a specific equilibrium for each of the nonpoint control schemes mentioned above, but individually does not explain experimental results. I will demonstrate that multi-objective optimization, where individuals are interested in maximizing a bundle (individual profit; payoff from a coalition, relative profit) is consistent with experimental data and accounts for recognized individual differences in players within a group (i.e. Kurzban & Houser, 2005).

The goal of this experimental study was to test an effectiveness of a group contract designed to control nonpoint source water pollution from farms' runoff (Pushkarskaya 2003). In particular, the regulator pays for pollution reduction credits earned by the group of the farmers, who voluntary enter the contract, and is concerned only with the total level of the abatement achieved, while the group of farmers undertakes responsibility to distribute the payment so as to induce the farmers to deliver the desired level of abatement. First round of experiments was conducted using as subjects undergraduate students from the Ohio State University, second round of experiments was conducted using as a subjects Kentucky farmers, who would be an actual subjects to this policy if it is ever implemented. Experiments with farmers can be considered as an intermediate step between traditional experiments with undergraduate students and field experiments. Results of these experiments suggest, in contrast to common believes among environmental economists, that uncertainty, associated with diffusive nature of nonpoint source water pollution, not only does not affect negatively farmers' participation in the program, but also might play a positive role in promoting a cooperation within a group.

We offer a decentralized solution to the asymmetric information and hidden action problems in the nonpoint source (NPS) pollution case. Farmers in the same watershed generate homogeneous NPS pollution. The regulator, R, pays for (or represents a group of point-source, PS, polluters who pay for) pollution reduction credits earned by the group of the farmers. To resolve the asymmetric information problem, R is concerned with only the total level of the abatement achieved, while the group of farmers (called the Association, A), undertakes responsibility to distribute the payment so as to induce farmers to deliver abatement. We show that A can devise an optimal contract to deal with the farmers' hidden action problem. We identify the restrictions under which such a policy can be implemented, evaluate its effects on the product market, and show that in the NPS case information rents are higher than in the PS case.