Min Gong's JDM Research

Research on

Judgment and Decision Making

Research Interets

I have very broad research interests. Currently I focus on group strategic behavior under uncertainty. Working with both Howard Kunreuther from the OPIM department and Jon Baron from Psychology, I use Interdependent Security Games to study questions such as: Does group polarization towards risk exist in stochastic prisoner's dillema? Are groups more rational (in an economic sense) than individuals and apply more strategies predicted by game theory? Do groups care more or less about externality than individuals do? While most of the games will be played by lab subjects, being Jon Baron's student, I am also a big fan of internet subjects.

Another my research interest is the choice overload problem and am working with Deborah Small from the Marketing department. Since in a lot of situations, consumers make decisions as groups, such as couples, families, teams, etc., it is important for researchers to understand whether and how groups repond differently from individuals to the choice set problem.

My other research interests include emotion effect in economic decisions, behavior finance, and survey methods. My Master's thesis was on th emotion- magnitude sensitivity interaction. You can download it below.

Past Research On Survey Methods

Gong, M. and J. Baron. “On the Generality of Emotion Effect on Magnitude Sensitivity.” Judgment and Decision Making Annual Meeting, Long Island, CA, November, 2007. A revision of this paper is currently under journal review.

Abstract

We present two studies to test whether emotion interferes with magnitude sensitivity. Magnitude sensitivity is defined as a subjective evaluation difference between a high magnitude and a low one. Emotion is measured by reported emotion rating on a scale of 0-100. Mixed effect models are used for data analysis. Previous research has reported that emotion reduces magnitude sensitivity under separate evaluation in a gain domain (Hsee and Rottenstreich, 2004). The focus of current study is to test the generality of this emotion effect across various settings, such as in gain or loss domains, and under separate or joint evaluation mode. Mixed results indicate that the emotion effect is real, but more complicated than what previous research found. Instead of a monotonic negative relationship between emotion level and magnitude sensitivity, the present study shows that there may be an inverted-U shaped relationship between them, and two opposing interactions may contribute simultaneously. Further research is needed to detangle what have caused the emotion effect and how the findings may be applied to fields such as improving magnitude sensitivity in contingent valuations.

You can download this paper by clicking here.

Interview Effects in Environmental Surveys (with David Aadland) Under review

Abstract

We investigate whether interview effects are present during willingness-to-pay (WTP) surveys for environmental goods. The existence of interview effects, especially those related to the race and gender of the interviewer, has been well documented for a variety of survey topics. Environmental valuation surveys, due to the limited experience agents typically have with environmental goods, are prime candidates for interview effects. We test for interview effects using a survey of recycling behavior administered to over 4000 households. The dataset includes a rich variety of interview and household characteristics, which we interact to isolate the type of households and interview variables that are most prone to interview effects. The estimates support the hypothesis that interview characteristics have a direct effect on respondents’ WTP for recycling services.

You can download this paper by clicking here.

Other Research Activity

As a Chinese, I am also very interested in how cultural differences influence people's decision processes. I am planning on setting up a Chinese website to run related web studies among Chinese people. I will post more information later. If you are interested in running studies on my Chinese site or participating in the design and maintenance, please contact me regarding the Chinese website.