Home

I am a Lecturer (Assistant Professor with tenure) at the Department of Economics, University of Essex, UK. I obtained my Ph.D. in Economics at HEC, University of Lausanne, Switzerland.  

Click here for my CV.

Research Fields: 

My research examines how organisational design, incentives, and social interactions shape individual and collective behaviour and performance.

Publications

"Motivation Complementarities in Prosocial Behavior: Evidence from Social Networks of Blood Donors" with Adrian Bruhin, Lorenz Goette, Simon Haenni, and Blood Transfusion Service of Red Cross (Games and Economic Behavior, 2026) 

"Understanding Mechanisms of Persistence in Prosocial Behavior" with Adrian Bruhin, Lorenz Goette, Simon Haenni, and Blood Transfusion Service of Red Cross (JPE: Micro, 2025)

"Improving Support for University Students with Type 1 Diabetes"  with Stoet, G., Foster, E., Kerr, C., Thornhill, M-A., Cyranka, K., Matejko, B., Sarna-Palacz, D., Płonka-Stępień, M. and Klupa, T. (The Lancet Diabetes & Endocrinology, 2024)

"Information Exchange and Multiple Peer Groups:   A Natural Experiment  in an Online Community"  with Zhen Zhu. (Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, 2022)

"Maternal Mental Health and  Social Support from Online Communities During Pregnancy" with Zhen Zhu. (Health and Social Care in the Community, 2022)

“Spillovers of Prosocial Motivation: Evidence from an Intervention Study on Blood Donors” with Adrian Bruhin, Lorenz Goette, and Simon Haenni. (Journal of Health Economics, 2020)

“Splash with A Teammate: Peer Effects in High-StakesTournaments” (Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, 2020)

“The Sting of Rejection:  Deferring Blood Donors due to Low Hemoglobin Values Reduces Future Returns” with seven coauthors (Transfusion Medicine and Hemotherapy, 2020)

Work in Progress

"Understanding the Educational Ecosystem Through Parents' Digital Footprints Over Children's Developmental Milestones" with Zhen Zhu

Abstract: Parents rarely talk about schooling in isolation. Using more than a decade of discussions from one of the world's largest online parenting communities, we examine the educational ecosystem through parents' digital footprints across children's developmental milestones. We show that the concerns accompanying education evolve systematically over the child life course. Health and wellbeing dominate education discussions in early childhood, academic performance becomes increasingly central during school years, parental conflict rises with age, and financial concerns become most salient in adulthood. Our findings demonstrate that education is embedded within a changing ecosystem of family concerns, offering new insights for education and family policy.

"Cultural Similarity and Team Performance: Evidence from Professional Doubles Tennis" with Alessandro Di Mattia

Abstract: Cultural similarity may facilitate team communication and coordination, yet evidence of whether such advantages translate into superior team performance remains mixed. We examine this question using all men’s doubles matches in Grand Slams from 2018 to 2025.  Culturally similar teams are more likely to win matches. However, the association disappears in tiebreaks, where competing teams are closely matched and the outcome is determined over a few points. The association is stronger as team members have accumulated more professional experience but remains muted as the experience gap between teammates widens. Finally, we provide evidence that while there is substantial cultural sorting in team formation, stronger individuals are not systematically more likely to select culturally similar partners, suggesting that our results are not purely driven by endogenous sorting among stronger players.

"Managerial Task Allocation in Team Work with mixed Genders" with Laura Mangold and Friederike Mengel

Abstract: In organizations, routine tasks are often associated with low promotability and considered as a barrier to completing tasks with higher priority. A common observation is that routine (non-routine) tasks are more often done by women (men) either because the routine tasks are more often assigned to women (demand driven) or women are more likely to volunteer to do such tasks (supply driven). We conduct an online experiment to study the demand side of task allocation by investigating managers’ decision in assigning routine and non-routine tasks and eliciting managers’ belief about workers’ performance. 

"Fair Play or Winning Ugly? Risk Taking Behavior in Elite Competition under Different Rules" with Alessandro Di Mattia, Pierre Regibeau, Katherine Rockett, and Elke Weidenholzer

Abstract: We study risk-taking behaviour of elite athletes in high-stake competition under different rules using data from the IAAF world championships. We focus on the decision to start a short distance run (100m). Waiting for the gun is safe (and fair) but lowers performance, while jumping the gun gains performance but takes the risk of being ruled a “false start”, resulting in the severe penalty of disqualification. In some sense it presents a mirror image of a Dutch auction where an early bid guarantees certainty but paying a higher price and a later bid could get a lower price but takes the risk of losing. The IAAF rules regarding false starts have been tightened a couple of times in the past two decades, offering a natural experiment. We find 1) Athletes with higher starting ability tend to wait for the gun, whereas those with lower starting ability tend to jump the gun. 2) Where athletes value finishing time rather than winning, they are more likely to wait for the gun all else equal. 3) The tendency to wait for the gun is increasing as the rules become stricter.