People: Faculty
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Roberto A. Weber
 Associate Professor Ph.D.:Carnegie Mellon University 1999 208 Porter Hall Pittsburgh, PA 15213 Office: PH 319B Phone: 412.268.3224 Fax: 412.268.6938 email:rweber@andrew.cmu.edu Center for Behavioral Decision Research View ALL Faculty |
Research Interests My research is focused mainly in two broad areas. First, I am interested in how people behave when outcomes to their actions are also determined by the actions of others. This kind of decision problem occurs frequently: from pairs of similar people engaged in simple bargaining over small amounts to large organizations requiring the coordinated activity of thousands of heterogeneous members. One way to approach the study of these situations is with game theory, which provides a tool for analyzing how behavior should be affected by changes in the structure of a situation. This tool provides a formal way to describe the key aspects of the situation and individuals' preferences that economists usually assume drive behavior. However, game theory is not the only useful approach, since the fields of experimental economics, social psychology, and organizational behavior are equally important in the study of these interactions. All of these fields address many of the same questions and researchers in any of them can benefit by paying attention to the others. A large part of my research lies at the intersection of these areas. This work consists mainly of using simple games and experiments to capture key aspects of complicated organizational and economic stituations, allowing us insight into how these aspects influence behavior in the real world. A second related area of my research has to do with how the predictions of economic models differ from the way people actually behave. This area, usually termed behavioral economics, is mainly concerned with how to improve the descriptive ability of economic theory. By questioning the validity of assumptions underlying economic models and replacing them with more realistic ones, the goal of behavioral economists is to construct a better theory of behavior in economic situations. This approach usually consists of two parts. The first consists of identifying areas of behavior where the standard economic models make systematically incorrect predictions. This can be done by using behavioral data from experiments and the field and by looking at relevant research in other fields such as psychology. The second step consists of incorporating the behavioral phenomena into economic theory, resulting in descriptively more valid models. Selected Publications Loewenstein, G., Prelec, D. & Weber, R.A. (1999) What me worry? A psychological perspective on economic aspects of retirement. In H.J. Aaron (Ed.), Behavioral dimensions of retirement economics (pp. 215-246) . Washington, D. C.: Brookings Institution Press and Russell Sage Foundation. Camerer, C. & Weber, R.A. (1999). The econometrics and behavioral economics of escalation of commitment: A re-examination of Staw and Hoang's NBA data. Journal of Economic Behavior and Organization, 39(1): 59-82. Palfrey, T. R., McKelvey, R.D. & Weber, R.A. (forthcoming) The effects of payoff magnitude and heterogeneity on behavior in 2x2 games with unique mixed strategy equilibria. Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization. Weber, R. A., Rottenstreich, Y., Camerer, C. & Knez, M. (forthcoming). The illusion of leadership: Misattribution of cause in coordination games. Organization Science. |