I am a Ph.D. Candidate in my sixth year at the University of California San Diego studying behavioral and experimental economics. My research uses laboratory experiments to examine how people make choices in controlled environments to understand how they think and make decisions in the world.
My research interests often involve asking about how people think about other people in strategic and nonstrategic environments. In order to make choices in the world which impact or are affected by others, it can be useful to make predictions about those others' preferences, incentives, information, sophistication, and how those others also think about other people still. In this pursuit, I have active projects studying bargaining games, paternalistic preferences, and conspiratorial thinking, all of which may involve or require people to form beliefs about others in order to decide on their best course of action.
In my free time, I like to play tennis, rock climb, and meet with friends for board games. I am also an avid poker player, escape room aficionado, and theater enthusiast.
My CV is available here.
About Me
Works in Progress
Messaging in Bargaining: Which Signals Work?
Abstract: In this laboratory experiment, I examine how the presence of specific forms of strategic communication influences participants' strategies and outcomes in bargaining games. I find that subjects use available communication to misrepresent their preferences, and observe substantial gains for subjects that do so relative to their payoffs in a non-communication environment.
Paternalism: an Information Account
In Progress
Abstract: In this experiment, I consider the role of differential information quality on an individual's decision of whether to intervene in another person's choice or not. In doing so, I estimate and compare an ``information premium" - a measure of how much better information one needs in order to intervene, to examine conditions when people are more or less likely to do so. I suggest that differences in choices ex-ante versus ex-post to signal realization may indicate whether paternalistic preferences are influenced by failures of contingent reasoning.
Research
I am the Lab Manager for the EconLab at UCSD, located in SSRB 165. I manage scheduling, recruitment, day to day operation, and support running experiments for faculty and graduate students engaged in in-person experimental research.
To go to the EconLab website, click here.
To become a subject, go the link above and click "request account." Most studies are available for UCSD students 18 years old and above.
Teaching
In addition to my research, I have been a Graduate Student Teaching Assistant in the following courses:
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Principles of Microeconomics
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Intermediate Microeconomics (A/B/C)
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Economics of the Environment
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Economics of Discrimination
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Industrial & Organizational Economics