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26 Nov 2013
First Look

First Look: November 26

Beshears, John, James J. Choi, David Laibson, Brigitte C. Madrian, and Gwendolyn Reynolds Abstract—Objectives: To... View Details

Keywords: Sean Silverthorne

January 2025
Article

Automatic Enrollment with a 12% Default Contribution Rate

By: John Beshears, Ruofei Guo, David Laibson, Brigitte C. Madrian and James J. Choi

We study a retirement savings plan with a default contribution rate of 12% of income, which is much higher than previously studied defaults. Twenty-five percent of employees had not opted out of this default 12 months after hire; a literature review finds that the... View Details

Keywords: Retirement Savings; Defined Contribution Retirement Plan; Automatic Enrollment; Retirement; Saving; Income; Decision Choices and Conditions

August 2020
Article

Do Physician Incentives Increase Patient Medication Adherence?

By: Edward Kong, John Beshears, David Laibson, Brigitte Madrian, Kevin Volpp, George Loewenstein, Jonathan Kolstad and James J. Choi

We conducted a randomized experiment (911 primary care practices and 8,935 nonadherent patients) to test the effect of paying physicians for increasing patient medication adherence in three drug classes: diabetes medication, antihypertensives, and statins. We measured... View Details

Keywords: Health Economics; Medication Adherence; Physician Payment Incentives; Primary Care; Quality Improvement; Health Care and Treatment; Motivation and Incentives; Behavior

01 Aug 2017
First Look

First Look at New Research and Ideas, August 1

July 31, 2017 AIDS A Commitment Contract to Achieve Virologic Suppression in Poorly Adherent Patients with HIV/AIDS By: Alsan, Marcella, John Beshears, Wendy S. Armstrong, View Details

Keywords: Sean Silverthorne

2013
Article

What Goes Up Must Come Down? Experimental Evidence on Intuitive Forecasting

By: John Beshears, James J. Choi, Andreas Fuster, David Laibson and Brigitte C. Madrian

Do laboratory subjects correctly perceive the dynamics of a mean-reverting time series? In our experiment, subjects receive historical data and make forecasts at different horizons. The time series process that we use features short-run momentum and long-run partial... View Details

Keywords: Forecasting and Prediction; Cognition and Thinking

July 31, 2017
Article

A Commitment Contract to Achieve Virologic Suppression in Poorly Adherent Patients with HIV/AIDS

By: Marcella Alsan, John Beshears, Wendy S. Armstrong, James J. Choi, Brigitte C. Madrian, Minh Ly T. Nguyen, Carlos Del Rio, David Laibson and Vincent C. Marconi

Objective: Assess whether a commitment contract informed by behavioral economics leads to persistent virologic suppression among HIV-positive patients with poor antiretroviral therapy (ART) adherence. Design: Single-center pilot randomized clinical trial and a... View Details

Keywords: Adherence; Antiretroviral Therapy; Behavioral Economics; Commitment Contract; Financial Incentives; HIV-1 Virologic Suppression; Health Disorders; Motivation and Incentives

2013
Article

Planning Prompts as a Means of Increasing Preventive Screening Rates

By: Katherine L Milkman, John Beshears, James J. Choi, David Laibson and Brigitte C. Madrian

Keywords: Reminder Systems; Communication; Economics; Behavioral; Primary Prevention; Colonoscopy; Memory; Behavior; Health Care and Treatment; Health Testing and Trials; Communication Strategy; Health Industry

2012
Article

Planning Prompts as a Means of Increasing Rates of Immunization and Preventive Screening

By: Hengchen Dai, Katherine L. Milkman, John Beshears, James J. Choi, David Laibson and Brigitte C. Madrian

2024
Working Paper

Employer-Based Short-Term Savings Accounts

By: Sarah Holmes Berk, John Beshears, Jay Garg, James J. Choi and David Laibson

We study the introduction of a choice architecture design intended to increase short-term savings among employees at five U.K. firms. Employees were offered the opportunity to opt into a payroll deduction program that auto-deposits funds from each paycheck into a... View Details

Keywords: Behavior; Personal Finance; Investment Funds; Employees; Saving; United Kingdom

2024
Working Paper

Automating Short-Term Payroll Savings: Evidence from Two Large U.K. Experiments

By: Sarah Holmes Berk, James J. Choi, Jay Garg, John Beshears and David Laibson

Automatic enrollment is often used to increase retirement savings. What are the effects of using it (or, alternatively, requiring an active enrollment choice) to increase short-term savings? We evaluate two experiments in the U.K. at employers that enable workers to... View Details

Keywords: Retirement Savings; Participation; Automatic Enrollment; Retirement; Human Resources

2025
Chapter

Employer-Based Short-Term Savings Accounts

By: Sarah Holmes Berk, John Beshears, Jay Garg, James J. Choi and David Laibson

We study the introduction of a choice architecture design intended to increase short-term savings among employees at five U.K. firms. Employees were offered the opportunity to opt into a payroll deduction program that auto-deposits funds from each paycheck into a... View Details

Keywords: Personal Finance; Compensation and Benefits; Well-being; Behavior; Investment Funds; Employees; United Kingdom

2010
Chapter

Public Policy and Saving for Retirement: The 'Autosave' Features of the Pension Protection Act of 2006

By: John Beshears, James J. Choi, David Laibson, Brigitte C. Madrian and Brian Weller

September 2013
Article

Testimonials Do Not Convert Patients from Brand to Generic Medication

By: John Beshears, James J. Choi, David Laibson, Brigitte C. Madrian and Gwendolyn Reynolds

Objectives: To assess whether the addition of a peer testimonial to an informational mailing increases conversion rates from brand name prescription medications to lower-cost therapeutic equivalents, and whether the testimonial's efficacy increases when... View Details

Keywords: Testimonial; Peer Information; Social Proximity; Communication; Generic Medication; Familiarity; Marketing Communications; Decision Choices and Conditions; Identity; Health Care and Treatment; Marketing Reference Programs; Power and Influence; Brands and Branding; Health Industry

Article

The Effect of Providing Peer Information on Retirement Savings Decisions

By: John Beshears, James J. Choi, David Laibson, Brigitte C. Madrian and Katherine L. Milkman

Using a field experiment in a 401(k) plan, we measure the effect of disseminating information about peer behavior on savings. Low-saving employees received simplified plan enrollment or contribution increase forms. A randomized subset of forms stated the fraction of... View Details

Keywords: Saving; Decision Choices and Conditions; Retirement

2023
Article

A Randomized Trial of Behavioral Nudges Delivered through Text Messages to Increase Influenza Vaccination among Patients with an Upcoming Primary Care Visit

By: Mitesh S. Patel, Katherine L. Milkman, Linnea Gandhi, Heather N. Graci, Dena Gromet, Hung Ho, Joseph S. Kay, Timothy W. Lee, Jake Rothschild, Modupe Akinola, John Beshears, Jonathan E. Bogard, Alison Buttenheim, Christopher Chabris, Gretchen B. Chapman, James J. Choi, Hengchen Dai, Craig R. Fox, Amir Goren, Matthew D. Hilchey, Jillian Hmurovic, Leslie John, Dean Karlan, Melanie Kim, David Laibson, Cait Lamberton, Brigitte C. Madrian, Michelle N. Meyer, Maria Modanu, Jimin Nam, Todd Rogers, Renante Rondina, Silvia Saccardo, Maheen Shermohammed, Dilip Soman, Jehan Sparks, Caleb Warren, Megan Weber, Ron Berman, Chalanda N. Evans, Seung Hyeong Lee, Christopher K. Snider, Eli Tsukayama, Christophe Van den Bulte, Kevin G. Volpp and Angela L. Duckworth

Purpose: To evaluate if nudges delivered by text message prior to an upcoming primary care visit can increase influenza vaccination rates.
Design: Randomized, controlled trial.
Setting: Two health systems in the Northeastern US between September 2020 and... View Details

Keywords: Vaccination; Health Care and Treatment; Interpersonal Communication; Communication Technology; Behavior; Health Industry

Article

A Megastudy of Text-Based Nudges Encouraging Patients to Get Vaccinated at an Upcoming Doctor's Appointment

By: Katherine L. Milkman, Mitesh S. Patel, Linnea Gandhi, Heather N. Graci, Dena M. Gromet, Hung Ho, Joseph S. Kay, Timothy W. Lee, Modupe Akinola, John Beshears, Jonathan E. Bogard, Alison Buttenheim, Christopher F. Chabris, Gretchen B. Chapman, James J. Choi, Hengchen Dai, Craig R. Fox, Amir Goren, Matthew D. Hilchey, Jillian Hmurovic, Leslie K. John, Dean Karlan, Melanie Kim, David Laibson, Cait Lamberton, Brigitte C. Madrian, Michelle N. Meyer, Maria Modanu, Jimin Nam, Todd Rogers, Renante Rondina, Silvia Saccardo, Maheen Shermohammed, Dilip Soman, Jehan Sparks, Caleb Warren, Megan Weber, Ron Berman, Chalanda N. Evans, Christopher K. Snider, Eli Tsukayama, Christophe Van den Bulte, Kevin G. Volpp and Angela L. Duckworth

Many Americans fail to get life-saving vaccines each year, and the availability of a vaccine for COVID-19 makes the challenge of encouraging vaccination more urgent than ever. We present a large field experiment (N = 47,306) testing 19 nudges delivered to patients via... View Details

Keywords: Vaccination; COVID-19; Nudge; Influenza; Field Experiment; Health; Communication Strategy; Behavior