The 2D:4D ratio does not always correlate with economic behavior: A field experiment with African-Americans.

Several studies present evidence of correlations between prenatal testosterone exposure measured with the 2D:4D ratio and behaviors such as pro-social behavior, risk and patient attitudes, and self-employment. Individuals exposed prenatally to higher levels of testosterone have lower levels of risk aversion, higher levels of patience and invest more in others, and in themselves, therefore have higher individual financial wellbeing. We test these hypotheses with a sample of 115 African-Americans who live in a low-income urban area in the U.

Economic Preferences and Obesity among a Low-Income African American Community.

Obesity has reached epidemic proportions in the US, with a significantly higher fraction of African Americans who are obese than whites. Yet there is little understanding of why some individuals become obese while others do not. We conduct a lab-in-field experiment in a low-income African American community to investigate whether risk and time preferences play a role in the tendency to become obese.

Group-Level Selection Increases Cooperation in the Public Goods Game.

When groups compete for resources, some groups will be more successful than others, forcing out less successful groups. Group-level selection is the most extreme form of group competition, where the weaker group ceases to exist, becoming extinct. We implement group-level selection in a controlled laboratory experiment in order to study its impact on human cooperation.

Health behavior and behavioral economics: economic preferences and physical activity stages of change in a low-income African-American community.

Purpose: To examine the relationship between physical activity stages of change and preferences for financial risk and time.

Design: A cross-sectional, community-based study.

Setting: A low-income, urban, African-American neighborhood.