Publications

2007
Working Paper

Mental Accounting and Small Windfalls: Evidence from an Online Grocer

By: Katherine L. Milkman, John Beshears, Todd Rogers and Max H. Bazerman

We study the effect of small windfalls on consumer spending decisions by examining the purchasing behavior of a sample of online grocery shoppers over the course of a year. We compare the purchases customers make when redeeming a $10-off coupon they received from their... View Details

Keywords: Spending; Consumer Behavior; Mathematical Methods; Food and Beverage Industry; Retail Industry

12 Oct 2007
Working Paper Summaries

Mental Accounting and Small Windfalls: Evidence from an Online Grocer

Keywords: by Katherine L. Milkman, John Beshears, Todd Rogers & Max H. Bazerman

Mental Accounting and Small Windfalls: Evidence from an Online Grocer

24 Jun 2015
HBS Case

Upgrading School with a Startup Mentality

in the past year. The designation is an important one for AltSchool, since it credentials their pursuit of both a social mission and real profits. That dual mission, in turn, accounts in large part for how the company was able to raise... View Details

Keywords: Re: John Jong-Hyun Kim; Education

10 Feb 2021
News

Leading Through Transition: The Three-R Model Might Be the Answer

December 2020 (Revised June 2021)
Case

France Télécom (A): A Challenging Restructuring

By: Cynthia A. Montgomery and Ashley V. Whillans

These cases explore the impacts of industry shocks, resulting corporate actions that had a devastating impact on employees, and the legal conviction of corporate leaders for “institutional harassment."

This case series follows the evolution of France... View Details

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April 2023
Article

Inattentive Inference

By: Thomas Graeber

This paper studies how people infer a state of the world from information structures that include additional, payoff-irrelevant states. For example, learning from a customer review about a product’s quality requires accounting for the reviewer’s otherwise irrelevant... View Details

Keywords: Cognition and Thinking; Information Types; Behavior; Knowledge Acquisition

Article

The Effect of Dividends on Consumption

By: Malcolm Baker, Stefan Nagel and Jeffrey Wurgler

Classical models predict that the division of stock returns into dividends and capital appreciation does not affect investor consumption patterns, while mental accounting and other economic frictions predict that investors have a higher propensity to consume from... View Details

Keywords: Investment; Investment Return; Economics; Stocks; Capital; Business Earnings; Investment Portfolio; Investment Funds; Cost; Saving

2006
Working Paper

The Effect of Dividends on Consumption

By: Malcolm Baker, Stefan Nagel and Jeffrey Wurgler

Classical models predict that the division of stock returns into dividends and capital appreciation does not affect investor consumption patterns, while mental accounting and other economic frictions predict that investors have a higher propensity to consume from stock... View Details

Keywords: Demand and Consumers; Personal Finance; Investment Return; Household

16 May 2017
First Look

First Look at New Ideas and Research, May 16

promulgated by academic economists in the 1970s, is behind the idea that corporate managers should make shareholder value their primary concern and that boards should ensure they do. The theory regards shareholders as owners of the corporation—but raises grave View Details

Keywords: Re: Multiple Faculty

10 Apr 2021
News

Love them or hate them, virtual meetings are here to stay

2024
Working Paper

The Effects of Medical Debt Relief: Evidence from Two Randomized Experiments

By: Raymond Kluender, Neale Mahoney, Francis Wong and Wesley Yin

Two in five Americans have medical debt, nearly half of whom owe at least $2,500. Concerned by this burden, governments and private donors have undertaken large, high-profile efforts to relieve medical debt. We partnered with RIP Medical Debt to conduct two randomized... View Details

Keywords: Borrowing and Debt; Credit; Outcome or Result; Well-being; Personal Finance

20 Feb 2018
First Look

First Look at New Research and Ideas, February 20, 2018

advancing her enterprise's goals and objectives through a faster and ever-larger-reaching set of media. Publisher's link: https://www.hbs.edu/faculty/Pages/item.aspx?num=54007 Winter 2018 Journal of Economic Perspectives Frictions or View Details

Keywords: Sean Silverthorne

2019
Article

Creativity from Paradoxical Experience: A Theory of How Individuals Achieve Creativity while Adopting Paradoxical Frames

By: Goran Calic, Sébastien Hélie, Nick Bontis and Elaine Mosakowski

Purpose: Extant paradox theory suggests that adopting paradoxical frames, which are mental templates adopted by individuals in order to embrace contradictions, will result in superior firm performance. Superior performance is achieved through learning and creativity,... View Details

Keywords: Cognition and Thinking; Creativity; Learning

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09 Nov 2010
First Look

First Look: November 9, 2010

These People Is Your Future CEO? Authors:Boris Groysberg, Andrew Hill, and Toby Johnson Publication:Business Review 88, no. 11 (November 2010) Abstract Americans have long believed that U.S. military officers—trained for high-stakes positions, resilience, and View Details

Keywords: Sean Silverthorne

2010
Article

Budgeting, Psychological Contracts, and Budgetary Misreporting

By: Susanna Gallani, Ranjani Krishnan, Eric J. Marinich and Michael D. Shields

This study examines the effect of psychological contract breach on budgetary misreporting. Psychological contracts are mental models or schemas that govern how employees understand their exchange relationships with their employers. Psychological contract breach leads... View Details

Keywords: Budgeting; Psychological Contracts; Misreporting; Budgets and Budgeting; Employees; Trust