Publications

Article

Diverging Trends in Macro and Micro Volatility

By: Diego Comin and Sunil Mulani

This paper documents the diverging trends in volatility of the growth rate of sales at the aggregate and firm level. We establish that the upward trend in micro volatility is not simply driven by a compositional bias in the sample studied. We argue that this new fact... View Details

Keywords: Volatility; Mathematical Methods; Theory; Sales; Growth and Development

June 2008
Article

Minimally Acceptable Altruism and the Ultimatum Game

By: Julio J. Rotemberg

I suppose that people react with anger when others show themselves not to be minimally altruistic. With heterogeneous agents, this can account for the experimental results of ultimatum and dictator games. Moreover, it can account for the surprisingly large fraction of... View Details

Keywords: Philanthropy and Charitable Giving; Game Theory; Mathematical Methods

09 Oct 2012
First Look

First Look: October 9

markets, and the theory of market design. Publisher's Link: http://www.amazon.com/Auctions-Market-Mechanisms-Their-Applications/dp/3642309127 Data Scientist: The Sexiest Job of the 21st Century Authors:Thomas H. Davenport and D.J. Patil... View Details

Keywords: Sean Silverthorne

01 Jun 2008
News

Alumni Books

Johnson. Understanding College and University Organization: Theories for Effective Policy and Practice. 2 vols. by James L. Bess (MBA ’60) and Jay R. Dee (Stylus Publishing) The authors aim to show how college and university... View Details

Keywords: Management

17 Feb 2009
Research & Ideas

What’s Good about Quiet Rule-Breaking

What do software engineers, flight attendants, factory workers, mail carriers, truck drivers, and hospital nurses have in common? According to HBS professor Michel Anteby, these professions—and many others just as dissimilar, maybe even yours—inform a "moral gray... View Details

Keywords: by Martha Lagace

2011
Working Paper

Better-reply Dynamics in Deferred Acceptance Games

In this paper we address the question of learning in a two-sided matching mechanism that utilizes the deferred acceptance algorithm. We consider a repeated matching game where at each period agents observe their match and have the opportunity to revise their strategy... View Details

Keywords: Learning; Marketplace Matching; Outcome or Result; Game Theory; Mathematical Methods; Strategy

01 Sep 2003
News

Books

authors show managers how to use theory — statements of what causes what, why, and when — to make the process of creating new growth businesses more predictable. Using real-life examples of companies from a wide range of industries, the... View Details

Keywords: Deborah E. Blagg; Margie Kelley; Colleges, Universities, and Professional Schools; Educational Services

26 Oct 2015
News

Sal Khan Goes Back to School

teaching on the fly. “This is a lab for establishing new theories that could affect the rest of the planet,” Khan told Wired magazine recently. “The whole point is to catalyze change.” To learn more, read the complete article. View Details

Keywords: Khan Academy; Educational Services

24 Sep 2009
Working Paper Summaries

“I read Playboy for the articles”: Justifying and Rationalizing Questionable Preferences

Keywords: by Zoë Chance & Michael I. Norton

2001
Article

From Guilford to Creative Synergy: Opening the Black Box of Team Level Creativity

By: T. R. Kurtzberg and T. M. Amabile

Previous research, from Guilford's founding tradition to more modern research on individual creativity and general group processes, falls short of adequately describing team-level creativity. Alhough researchers have addressed brainstorming in groups with mixed... View Details

Keywords: Creativity; Groups and Teams; Theory; Research; Organizational Culture

Purchase

2012
Chapter

Problem Solving and Search in Networks

By: David Lazer and Ethan Bernstein

This chapter examines the role that networks play in facilitating or inhibiting search for solutions to problems at both the individual and collective levels. At the individual level, search in networks enables individuals to transport themselves to a very different... View Details

Keywords: Network Organizations; Search; Problem Solving; Individual; Individuals And Teams; Collective; Cognitive Search; Network Search; Search Typology; Networks; Social and Collaborative Networks; Theory; Knowledge Sharing

Article

The Valuation of Cash Flow Forecasts: An Empirical Analysis

By: S. N. Kaplan and R. S. Ruback

Keywords: Valuation; Cash Flow; Forecasting and Prediction; Theory

01 Feb 2001
News

Porter Appointed to University Professorship

His books can be found on the shelves of CEOs, heads of state, academicians, and business school students alike. Countries and companies all over the world have embraced his theories on competition and strategy in the expanding global... View Details

Keywords: Doug Gavel; University Professorship; C. Roland Christensen; Sumner H. Slichter

23 Apr 2019
First Look

New Research and Ideas, April 23, 2019

offer opportunities for future research. Publisher's link: https://www.hbs.edu/faculty/Pages/item.aspx?num=56001 Rehabilitating Corporate Purpose By: Salter, Malcolm S. Abstract—In this paper, I address how the ascendance of the theory of... View Details

Keywords: Dina Gerdeman

11 Feb 2013
Research & Ideas

Neuroeconomics: Eyes, Brain, Business

The children's classic The Polar Express tells the fanciful story of a young boy's journey to the North Pole on a train filled with chocolate and candy. But when Warner Brothers released a $165 million computer-animated version of the tale, many critics described the... View Details

Keywords: by Carmen Nobel

February 2021
Technical Note

Probability Distributions

By: Michael Parzen and Paul Hamilton

This technical note introduces students to the concept of random variables, and from there the normal and binomial distributions. After a brief introduction to random variables, the note describes the standard properties of the normal distribution: a single peak, and a... View Details

Keywords: Analysis; Risk and Uncertainty; Theory; Analytics and Data Science

Educators

Purchase

Article

Third-Party Punishment as a Costly Signal of High Continuation Probabilities in Repeated Games

By: Jillian J. Jordan and David G. Rand

Why do individuals pay costs to punish selfish behavior, even as third-party observers? A large body of research suggests that reputation plays an important role in motivating such third-party punishment (TPP). Here we focus on a recently proposed reputation-based... View Details

Keywords: Direct Reciprocity; Evolution; Dispersal; Cooperation; Trust; Reputation; Game Theory