In this paper, we model agent role adoption when they are under the influence of peers and must account for their capabilities as well. Our model suggests a strategy for role adoption that decreases tension among agents. We show the contention between considering social pressure versus role qualification as two factors for role adoption.

The blood pressures of 252 men and 250 women, living in both urban and rural Zimbabwe, were measured on three separate occasions. Food and alcohol intakes were determined using a 3-day weighed diet survey checked by means of a detailed interview. Anthropometric data were also collected. No relationship was found between mean blood pressures and the alcohol intake for any socioeconomic group. Us...

Constructivist literature has recently focused on how agents’ identities are changed when entering into new international communities. Jeffrey Checkel (2005) proposes that socialization is a process in which new members of a community become inducted into the norms of that community resulting in two types of internalization: Type I socialization, in which actors act in accordance with norms wit...

Every year, 90% of Americans give money to charities. Is such generosity necessarily welfare enhancing for the giver? We present a theoretical framework that distinguishes two types of motivation: individuals like to give, for example, due to altruism or warm glow, and individuals would rather not give but dislike saying no, for example, due to social pressure. We design a door-to-door fund-rai...

What makes people willing to pay costs to benefit others? Does such cooperation require effortful self-control, or do automatic, intuitive processes favor cooperation? Time pressure has been shown to increase cooperative behavior in Public Goods Games, implying a predisposition towards cooperation. Consistent with the hypothesis that this predisposition results from the fact that cooperation is...

In this paper, we consider the problem of the interplay between a population of (bounded) rational agents and an external authority in the context of a two-period participation game. The agents aim at maximizing the private utility deriving from taking part to a project, or an activity, over two subsequent time periods. On the opposite, the policy maker fixes prices/incentives in order to maxim...

The function of the social insurance system as a key part of the modern social security system is reflected in the operation of social insurance funds. The mode of social insurance funds forms the foundation for the social insurance system. To address the pressure of an aging population and to meet the demands of the rapid development of the capital market (especially in international capital f...