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AbstractAs in other sciences, an economic experiment is an artificial situation created by a researcher for the purpose of answering one or more scientific questions. Experiments of various types are used in economics to understand the causes of poverty and how it might be alleviated. The methods can identify causal relationships between variables and thereby isolate factors that can lead to poverty as well as to document the behavioral consequences of poverty. Experiments can also be used to provide test beds for proposed policies to alleviate poverty. This essay describes a variety of ways in which experiments have been employed to understand and combat poverty. A line of laboratory experiments that considers which economic institutions are conducive to economic growth is discussed in detail. The results show that decentralized markets are conducive to allowing an economy to operate as efficiently as it can. However, in an economy with a theoretical "poverty trap," the market works more efficiently if accompanied by a democratic voting process and freedom of communication.

PurposeThe authors consider whether the emotional states of happiness and fear causally affect test performance using a new experiment. The paper aims to discuss this issue.Design/methodology/approachHappiness and fear are induced with 360-degree videos shown in virtual reality before participants take a test consisting of mathematics scholastic aptitude tests (SAT) questions.FindingsThe results show that scores improve by 0.48 standard deviations under the happiness condition, and the effect is particularly large for women (0.75 s.d.). Inducing fear has no effect on test scores.Originality/valueThis is one of the first studies to employ virtual reality for emotion induction. It establishes that test scores can be improved by inducing an emotional state of happiness shortly before the test.

AbstractWe consider the relationship between emotions and decision‐making under risk. Specifically, we examine the emotional correlates of risk‐averse decisions. In our experiment, individuals' facial expressions are monitored with face reading software, as they are presented with risky lotteries. We then correlate these facial expressions with subsequent decisions in risky choice tasks. We find that a more positive emotional state is positively correlated with greater risk taking. The strength of a number of emotions, including fear, happiness, anger and surprise, is positively correlated with risk aversion.

PurposeThis paper aims to study how the trajectory of fundamental values affects price discovery in an experimental asset market.Design/methodology/approachAn experiment is conducted with two treatments, in which the time path of fundamentals differs between treatments. In the peak treatment, fundamentals first rise and then fall, while in the valley treatment fundamentals first fall and then recover. The experiment allows market prices to be compared to fundamental values.FindingsBoth peak and valley treatments experience bubbles when traders are inexperienced. However, price discovery is more rapid and complete in the peak than in the valley treatment. In the peak treatment, prices track the value, the direction of the trend, and changes in trend, more closely than in the valley treatment.Originality/valueThis paper documents the first experimental results regarding pricing behavior in markets with non‐monotonic fundamentals. It creates an environment (the valley treatment) in which convergence to close to fundamentals does not occur even with repetition of the market under identical conditions. The results demonstrate that the likelihood that an asset market tracks fundamentals depends on the time path of fundamentals.

This paper describes the design and behavior of an experimental economy with the structure of the Ramsey-Cass-Koopmans model of optimal growth. The experiment includes three different implementations of the model: a decentralized implementation with multiple agents and a market for capital, a treatment where individual subjects are placed in the role of social planners, and a treatment where the social planner consists of five agents making a joint decision. The findings highlight the role of market institutions in facilitating convergence to the optimal steady state.

We elicit traders' predictions of future price trajectories in repeated experimental markets for a 15-period-lived asset. We find that individuals' beliefs about prices are adaptive, and primarily based on past trends in the current and previous markets in which they have participated. Most traders do not anticipate market downturns the first time they participate in a market, and, when experienced, they typically overestimate the time remaining before market peaks and downturns occur. When prices deviate from fundamental values, belief data are informative to an observer in predicting the direction of future price movements and the timing of market peaks. (JEL C91, D12, D84, G11)