BSDIM · Behavioural Spillovers and the Design of Institutions and Markets

Behavioural Spillovers are observed across many markets and institutions. The equity premium puzzle in financial markets can be thought of as resulting from behavioural spillovers, but there are many other examples. With the IEF we have tried to understand how such spillovers can arise. With the reintegration grant we aim to show how this understanding of spillovers can be used for the design of markets and institutions.In the first year of the IEF (PIEF-2009-235973) we have successfully developed a theoretical framework to understand how behavioural spillovers can arise. The research articles resulting from this part of the project have been submitted to international Journals and we have already been requested to revise several of them for publication.The current proposal aims at taking this project a step further in order to study how such behavioural spillovers can be made use of for a more efficient design of institutions and markets. The proposal consists of three main objectives, which we will describe in the following. Part 1) consists in developing a theoretical framework to understand how behavioural spillovers can be exploited for institution and market design. Part 2) aims at understanding behavioural spillovers in specific markets and institutions, where in particular we will study (a) risk-taking behaviour in financial markets and (b) the provision of public goods. Part 1) and Part 2) are not clearly separated in time and can be worked on simultaneously. Part 3) integrates the two previous steps to show how (a) financial markets as well as (b) mechanisms for the provision of public goods can be improved to account for the behavioural spillovers identified.The project will be executed at Maastricht University in close collaboration with an international group of researchers mainly from the department of Economics, but also with some psychologists.""