News

Do you know anyone who has symptoms like this 14-year-old with neuromuscular disorder?

Teaching

• Judgments and decisions (153), fall 2008, MW 2-3:30.
• Judgments and decisions proseminar (600), fall 2008, WF 12-2.
• Independent study, graduate students, research assistance.

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• Behavioral law and economics (253), fall 2007, MW 2-3:30.

Research

I study intuitions and judgment biases that impede maximization of utility (good) by democratic government. These include parochialism, the act-omission distinction, moralistic values, and the isolation effect. Relevant rubrics are Behavioral Public Finance, Behavioral Public Economics, and Behavioral Law and Economics. I am also interested in experimentation and data analysis.

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• Vita (html), (pdf) (with mailing address)
• Web studies, template for them (pretty code), with bars (fails in IE)
• Public archives of recent experiments and data

Books

• Baron J. (1985). Rationality and intelligence. Cambridge University Press.
• Baron, J. (1988, 1994, 2000, 2008). Thinking and Deciding. Cambridge University Press. (Chinese translation of 3d ed. published by Sichuan People's Publishing House, 2004.) (New Chinese translation to be published by China Light Industry Press.)
• Baron, J. & Brown, R. V. (Eds.) (1991). Teaching decision making to adolescents. Erlbaum.
• Baron, J. (1993). Morality and rational choice. Kluwer (now Springer).
• Mellers, B. A. & Baron, J. (Eds.) (1993). Psychological perspectives on justice. Cambridge University Press.
• Baron, J. (1998). Judgment misguided: Intuition and error in public decision making [full text, with permission]. (Published by Oxford University Press).
• Weber, E. U., Baron, J., & Loomes, G., (Eds.) (2000). Conflict and tradeoffs in decision making: Essays in honor of Jane Beattie. Cambridge University Press.
• Bazerman, M. H., Baron, J., & Shonk, K. (2001). You can't enlarge the pie: The psychology of ineffective government. Basic Books.
• Baron, J. (2006). Against bioethics. MIT Press. (Sample chapters.)

Some drafts and talks

• Baron, J. (2008). Parochialism as a result of cognitive biases.
• Baron, J. (2008). Cognitive biases in moral judgments that affect political behavior.
• Baron, J., & Ritov. I. (2008). Protected values and omission bias as deontological judgments.
• Baron, J., & Ritov, I. (2007). The role of probability of detection in judgments of punishment.
• Ritov, I., & Baron, J. (2007). Joint presentation reduces the effect of emotion on evaluation of public actions.
• Baron, J., & Gurmankin, A. D. (2003). Cost benefit analysis can increase trust in decision makers.
• Baron, J. & Ritov, I. (2003). The omission and the bias exist: Reply to Connolly and Reb.
• Baron, J., Gurmankin, A. D., & Kunreuther, H. (2003). A comparative approach to protective behavior. (pdf)
• Baron, J. (2002). Value trade-offs and the nature of utility: bias, inconsistency, protected values, and other problems. Prepared for conference on Behavioral Economics and Neoclassical Economics, American Institute for Economic Research, Great Barrington, MA, July, 2002.
• Baron, J. (2000). The effects of overgeneralization on public policy. Prepared for Experimental Methods Conference, Center for Basic Research in the Social Sciences, Harvard, Nov. 17-18, 2000. (Outline.)

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• The following slides work properly with Firefox.
• Moral heuristics and biases, Presidential Address, Society for Judgment and Decision Making (SJDM), 11/19/07.
• Heuristics and biases in charity. (Presented at Princeton, 7/13/07, Co-author: Ewa Szymanska.)
• Citizens as moralists. (Presented at Stanford GSB, 5/30/07.)
• Cognitive biases that support parochialism. (Presented at SJDM, 11/06.)
• Parochialism and approval voting, slides for SABE/IAREP talk and link to paper.
• Thinking about tax, slides for 9/27/05 Penn Colloquium, with link to papers.
• Thinking about global warming, slides for 11/12/04 Princeton meeting.

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• My papers listed at Social Science Research Network (SSRN).

Articles made public only on the Web (here):

• Baron, J., & Li, Y. (2000, revised more recently). Notes on the use of R for psychology experiments and questionnaires.
• Lim, C. S., & Baron, J. (1997). Protected values in Malaysia, Singapore, and the United States.
• Baron, J., Neiderhiser, B., & Gandy, O. H. (1997). Perceptions and attributions of race differences in health risks.
• Eisenberg, A. E., Baron, J., & Seligman, M. E. P. (1996). Individual differences in risk aversion and anxiety.
• Prasad, P., & Baron, J. (1995). Measurement of gender-role attitudes, beliefs, and principles. (Contains survey.) (Data for this study.)
• Chaitas, S., Solodkin, A, & Baron, J. (1995). Students' attitudes toward social dilemmas in Argentina, Mexico, and the United States
• Baron, J., Laskey, K., and Brown, R. V. (1989). Going through the goop: An introduction to decision making. (Written for high-school students.)
• Baron, J., Schulkin, J., & Kunreuther, H. (1990). Perceived uncertainty and the response to global warming.

Articles published or in press

Note: These are (except when noted) pre-publication versions, not identical to published versions. Articles published in journals of the American Psychological Associated (APA) are copyright APA.

• Baron, J. (1975). Stimuli and subjects in one-tailed tests. Bulletin of the Psychonomic Society, 6, 608-610.
• Baron, J. & Treiman, R. (1980). Some problems in the study of differences in cognitive processes. Memory and Cognition, 8, 313-321.
• Frisch, D., & Baron, J. (1988). Ambiguity and rationality. Journal of Behavioral Decision Making, 1, 149-157.
• Baron, J., & Hershey, J. C. (1988). Outcome bias in decision evaluation. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 54, 569-579.
• Baron, J. (1988). Utility, exchange, and commensurability. Journal of Thought, 23, 111-131.
• Ritov, I., & Baron, J. (1990). Reluctance to vaccinate: omission bias and ambiguity. Journal of Behavioral Decision Making, 3, 263-277. (Reprinted in C. Sunstein (Ed.), Behavioral Law and Economics. New York: Cambridge University Press, 2000.)
• Spranca, M., Minsk, E., & Baron, J. (1991). Omission and commission in judgment and choice. Journal of Experimental Social Psychology, 27, 76-105. (pdf)
• Ritov, I., & Baron, J. (1992). Status-quo and omission bias. Journal of Risk and Uncertainty, 5, 49-61.
• Baron, J. (1992). The effect of normative beliefs on anticipated emotions. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 63, 320-330.
• Baron, J. (1993). Why teach thinking? - An essay. (Target article, commentary and reply not included here.) Applied Psychology: An International Review, 42, 191-237.
• Baron, J. & Jurney, J. (1993). Norms against voting for coerced reform. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 64, 347-355
• Baron, J. (1993). Heuristics and biases in equity judgments: a utilitarian approach. In B. A. Mellers and J. Baron (Eds.), Psychological perspectives on justice: Theory and applications, pp. 109-137. New York: Cambridge University Press.
• Baron, J. & Ritov, I. (1993). Intuitions about penalties and compensation in the context of tort law. Journal of Risk and Uncertainty, 7, 17-33. (pdf)
• Baron, J., Gowda, R., & Kunreuther, H. (1993). Attitudes toward managing hazardous waste: What should be cleaned up and who should pay for it? Risk Analysis, 13, 183-192.
• Baron, J. & Ritov, I. (1994). Reference points and omission bias. Organizational Behavior and Human Decision Processes, 59, 475-498.
• Baron, J. (1994). Nonconsequentialist decisions (with commentary and reply). Behavioral and Brain Sciences, 17, 1-42.
• Beattie, J., Baron, J., Hershey, J. C., & Spranca, M. (1994). Determinants of decision attitude. Journal of Behavioral Decision Making, 7, 129-144. (scanned png images)
• Baron, J. (1995). Myside bias in thinking about abortion. Thinking and Reasoning, 1, 221-235. (pdf)
• Baron, J. (1995). Blind justice: Fairness to groups and the do-no-harm principle. Journal of Behavioral Decision Making, 8, 71-83. (pdf)
• Baron, J. (1995). A psychological view of moral intuition. Harvard Review of Philosophy, 5, 36--40.
• Beattie, J. & Baron, J. (1995). In-kind vs. out-of-kind penalties: preference and valuation. Journal of Experimental Psychology: Applied, 1, 136-151. (pdf)
• Ritov, I., & Baron, J. (1995). Outcome knowledge, regret, and omission bias. Organizational Behavior and Human Decision Processes, 64, 119-127.
• Baron, J. (1996). Norm-endorsement utilitarianism and the nature of utility. Economics and Philosophy, 12, 165-182.
• Baron, J. (1996). Do no harm. In D. M. Messick & A. E. Tenbrunsel (Eds.), Codes of conduct: Behavioral research into business ethics, pp. 197-213. New York: Russell Sage Foundation.
• Baron, J., & Greene, J. (1996). Determinants of insensitivity to quantity in valuation of public goods: contribution, warm glow, budget constraints, availability, and prominence. Journal of Experimental Psychology: Applied, 2, 107-125.
• Haidt, J., & Baron, J. (1996). Social roles and the moral judgement of acts and omissions. European Journal of Social Psychology, 26, 201-218.
• Baron, J., & Maxwell, N. P. (1996). Cost of public goods affects willingness to pay for them. Journal of Behavioral Decision Making, 9, 173-183.
• Baron, J. (1997). Biases in the quantitative measurement of values for public decisions. Psychological Bulletin, 122, 72-88.
• Baron, J. (1997). Political action vs. voluntarism in social dilemmas and aid for the needy. Rationality and Society, 9, 307-326.
• Baron, J., & Spranca, M. (1997). Protected values. Organizational Behavior and Human Decision Processes, 70, 1-16.
• Baron, J. (1998). Judgment misguided: Intuition and error in public decision making. (Published by Oxford University Press).
• Ritov, I., & Baron, J. (1999). Protected values and omission bias. Organizational Behavior and Human Decision Processes, 79, 79-94.
• Baron, J., & Siepmann, M. (2000). Using web questionnaires for judgment and decision making research. In M. H. Birnbaum (Ed.), "Psychological Experiments on the Internet" (New York: Academic Press).
• Baron, J., & Leshner, S. (2000). How serious are expressions of protected values. Journal of Experimental Psychology: Applied, 6, 183-194.
• Baron, J., Hershey, J. C., & Kunreuther, H. (2000). Determinants of priority for risk reduction: the role of worry. Risk Analysis, 20, 413-428.
• Baron, J. (2000). Measuring value tradeoffs: problems and some solutions. In Elke Weber, Jonathan Baron, and Graham Loomes (Eds.), Conflict and Tradeoffs in Decision making: Essays in Honor of Jane Beattie, pp. 231-259. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
• Baron, J. (2000). Can we use human judgments to determine the discount rate? Risk Analsysis, 20, 861-868.
• Greene, J., & Baron, J. (2000). Intuitions about declining marginal utility. Journal of Behavioral Decision Making, 14, 243-255.
• Baron, J., Wu, Z., Brennan, D. J., Weeks C., and Ubel, P. A., (2001). Analog scale, ratio judgment and person trade-off as utility measures: biases and their correction. Journal of Behavioral Decision Making, 14, 17-34.
• Baron, J., & Ubel, P. A. (2001). The desire to revise a priority list based on cost-effectiveness: The role of the prominence effect and distorted utility judgments. Medical Decision Making, 21, 278-287. ohp1-4
• Baron, J. (2001). Confusion of group-interest and self-interest in parochial cooperation on behalf of a group. Journal of Conflict Resolution, 45, 283-296.
• Royzman, E. B., & Baron, J. (2002). The preference for indirect harm. Social Justice Research, 15, 165-184. (pdf)
• Baron, J. (2003). Value analysis of political behavior - self-interested : moralistic :: altruistic : moral. University of Pennsylvania Law Review, 151, 1135-1167.
• Baron, J., & Kemp, S. (2004). Support for trade restrictions, attitudes, and understanding of comparative advantage. Journal of Economic Psychology, 25, 565-580.
• Baron, J. & Ritov, I. (2004). Omission bias, individual differences, and normality. Organizational Behavior and Human Decision Processes, 94, 74-85.
• Baron, J. (2006). Thinking about global warming. Climatic Change (special issue on "The psychology of long term risk" edited by A. Todorov and M. Oppenheimer), 77, 137-150.