Charles Sprenger
Professor of Economics; Executive Officer for the Social Sciences
B.A., Stanford University, 2002; M.Sc., University College London, 2005; Ph.D., University of California, San Diego, 2011. Professor, Caltech, 2020-; Executive Officer, 2022-.
Profile
Charlie Sprenger is a behavioral and experimental economist. His research focus is intertemporal decision making and decision making under uncertainty. He designs experiments to test how people behave when faced with various decisions, ranging from food choices to the implementation of vaccination programs and more. His experiments have shown that the standard economic models of behavior are not
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Research Summary
Behavioral Economics; Intertemporal Choice; Risky Choice
Selected Awards
- Sloan Foundation Fellowship, 2016-2018
External Affiliations
- Board of Editors, American Economic Review
- Associate Editor, Journal of the European Economic Association
- Associate Editor, Quantitative Economics
Featured News
Experimental Economics in Theory and Practice
July 23, 2023
A summer program brings graduate students from across the United States to learn and practice theory-driven experimental research in economics
Reducing Procrastination with Tailored Incentives
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February 07, 2023
Charlie Sprenger and other researchers tackle procrastination by vaccine workers in Pakistan.
Selected Publications
- McGranaghan, Christina;Nielsen, Kirby et al. (2024) Distinguishing Common Ratio Preferences from Common Ratio Effects Using Paired Valuation TasksAmerican Economic Review
- Martinez, Seung-Keun;Meier, Stephan et al. (2023) Procrastination in the Field: Evidence from Tax FilingJournal of the European Economic Association
- Andreoni, James;Callen, Michael et al. (2023) Using Preference Estimates to Customize Incentives: An Application to Polio Vaccination Drives in PakistanJournal of the European Economic Association
- Bernheim, B. Douglas;Royer, Rebecca et al. (2022) Robustness of Rank Independence in Risky ChoiceAEA Papers and Proceedings
- Aycinena, Diego;Blazsek, Szabolcs et al. (2022) Intertemporal choice experiments and large-stakes behaviorJournal of Economic Behavior & Organization
- Sadoff, Sally;Samek, Anya et al. (2020) Dynamic Inconsistency in Food Choice: Experimental Evidence from Two Food DesertsReview of Economic Studies
- Goette, Lorenz;Graeber, Thomas et al. (2020) Heterogeneity of Gain-Loss Attitudes and Expectations-Based Reference Points
- Bernheim, B. Douglas;Sprenger, Charles (2020) On the Empirical Validity of Cumulative Prospect Theory: Experimental Evidence of Rank-Independent Probability Weighting
- Andreoni, James;Kuhn, Michael A. et al. (2019) Toward an understanding of the development of time preferences: Evidence from field experimentsJournal of Public Economics
- Cerulli-Harms, Annette;Goette, Lorenz et al. (2019) Randomizing Endowments: An Experimental Study of Rational Expectations and Reference-Dependent PreferencesAmerican Economic Journal: Microeconomics