Gergely Hajdu

New working paper alert: we provide a model of post-hoc rationalizations, driven by motives of (self-)esteem. We show how this can lead to groupthink, polarization, and a preference for echo chambers.

www.ifo.de/sites/defaul...

2025 European Meeting of the Economic Science Association in Brno, Czech Republic | 2025 ESA European Meeting Join the European Meeting of the Economic Science Association 2025 at Masaryk University.

Excited to (finally) share I’m joining Masaryk University in Brno for a postdoc --- no teaching, more time for research 🙌 Looking forward to my time there with a great group! I’ll be around for ESA Europe 2025 too --- last day to submit: esa2025.econ.muni.cz Come say hi in Brno! #ESAEurope

I have a postdoc position in Behavioral/Experimental Economics available for 6 years, at the oldest university in Germany in beautiful Heidelberg. Please forward to anyone who might be interested!

#EconJobs #AcademicJobs #HigherEd #Economics #JobAlert

Zelensky is a wartime leader watching his people suffer and die under Russian attacks every day. To be lectured and lied to by Trump and Vance, as they defend the war criminal dictator committing these atrocities, is unimaginable agony. An everlasting shame for America.

Thanks! ☺️

Lengthy waiting corrupts, especially when unexpected Results of two studies demonstrate that long and unexpected waits adversely shape moral behavior. In Study 1, passengers who had just joined the check…

🚨 New publication alert!

✈️ Does waiting make us less honest?

🧐 In our study, participants waited—some in the lab, some at an airport. Once their wait was over, we tested their honesty.

👉Read more: www.sciencedirect.com/science/arti...

👂Listen to NotebookLM: tinyurl.com/3ncynv5s

#jebo #econsky

In case the pervious link wouldn’t work: papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers....

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💡 For more details, check out our full paper papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers....

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📌 Examples:

A long, unexpected wait at a bank 🏦 might lead a frustrated customer to misreport income on a loan application.

Delayed exams 📝 could push students to justify cutting corners to recover lost time.

Everyday frustrations might have deeper ethical consequences than we realize.

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🤯 Why does this happen?

We propose a mechanism called “cross-domain compensation”: When people feel they’ve lost time—especially through unexpected delays—they develop a sense of being “owed”. This can lead to relaxing moral constraints to "make up" for that loss.

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🧪 Study 2: Lab Experiment

Participants were randomly assigned to short or long waits, with the duration either disclosed or not. Afterward, they completed a die-roll task where higher reports meant higher payoffs.

Result: A long, unexpected wait triggered the highest levels of dishonesty.

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✈️ Study 1: Airport Field Experiment

Passengers waited in a check-in queue and were then asked to report a die roll in private, knowing that higher reports would yield higher payoffs. 📈

Finding: The longer passengers waited, the more they inflated their die-roll outcomes for personal gain.

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⏳ We’ve all experienced the frustration of waiting—whether at a border crossing, waiting for an exam to start, or stuck in line for concert tickets. But when those waits stretch on unexpectedly, could they influence the moral decisions we make afterward? 🤔 Our research explores this question.

1st Berlin Micro Theory and Behavioral Economics PhD Conference Berlin, July 7-9, 2025

⏳ Final Call: Submit your Paper or Extended Abstract for the 1st Berlin Micro Theory & Behavioral Economics PhD Conference!
❗️Deadline: Jan 20

📅July 7–9, 2025
📍 WZB Berlin (@wzb.bsky.social)
🔹 Keynotes by Dorothea Kübler & Paul Heidhues
✔️ Free, with accommodation!
🔗 www.wzb.eu/en/events/1s...

YEM 2025 | YEM: Young Economists' Meeting YEM: Young Economists' Meeting in Brno, Czech Republic

📢 Call for papers #YEM2025
📅 May 22-23 2025 in Brno, Czech Republic
🗒️Topics: Applied Empirical Research, Labor Economics, Experimental Economics and Behavioral Theory
👥Keynotes: @dkuebler.bsky.social @neumarkecon.bsky.social
✅Submit paper by Feb 17
ℹ️Details: yem.econ.muni.cz

Gergely Hajdu

🚀 I am on the #EconJobMarket!

📜 In my JMP, I study how choosing a product shapes beliefs about product qualities, using a novel experimental design.

🌐 To read about this project or my work on Choice-induced Sticky Learning and more, visit: sites.google.com/view/gergely...

Totally agree with @shengwuli.bsky.social.
The broader point is that I think we need to directly address the elephant in the room: the *huge* impact of context--i.e., seemingly irrelevant factors--on choice and beliefs.

🧵 on the behavioral economics of context, with some new data at the end.