I am Professor of Economics at the University of Bremen, SOCIUM – Research Center on Inequality and Social Policy. Below you can browse my publications. Contact details are at the bottom. Feel free to contact me if you have any questions, comments or requests.

Here is a link to my [CV].
 

Research Interests
 
My research interests lie in the fields of public, behavioral, organizational, and development economics. I apply game theory and experiments (lab and field) to address my research questions.

My primary areas of focus are decision-making and communication in groups, human-machine interactions, as well as the evaluation of social-policy interventions.
 

Working Papers

Too good to be True – Individual and Collective Decision-Making with Misleading Signals (with Anna Hochleitner and Moritz Janas), R&R at Management Science, [link].

Social Norms and Female Labor Force Participation in Bangladesh: The Role of Social Expectations and Reference Networks (with Luna Bellani, Kumar Biswas, Paul Marx, Shwetlena Sabarwal, and Syed Rashed Al-Zayed Josh), R&R at the Journal of Development Studies, [link].

Similarity and Consistency in Algorithm-Guided Exploration (with Yongping Bao, Ludwig Danwitz, Fabian Dvorak, Lars Hornuf, Hsuan Yu Lin, and Bettina von Helversen), R&R at the Journal of Behavioral Decision Making, [link].

What do citizens expect from space? (with Lars Hornuf and Daniel Vrankar), R&R at Acta Astronautica, [link].

Missing the target: Does increased capacity of the local government improve beneficiary selection? (with Viola Asri, Kumar Biswas, Urs Fischbacher, Katharina Michaelowa, and Atonu Rabbani), [link].

Cooperation with Finite-Lived Committee Members in Indefinitely Repeated Games (with Yongping Bao and Volker Hahn), [link].

Sustaining Cooperation with Correlated Information: An Experimental Test (with Yongping Bao and Fabian Dvorak), [link].

Beliefs about Others: A Striking Example of Information Neglect (with Baiba Renerte, and Irenaeus Wolff), [link].
 

Publications

Refereed Journals

Adverse Reactions to the Use of Large-Language-Models in Social Interactions (with Fabian Dvorak, Regina Stumpf, and Urs Fischbacher), PNAS Nexus, 4, 1-11, 2025, [link].

Negotiating Cooperation under Uncertainty: Communication in Noisy, Indefinitely Repeated Interactions (with Fabian Dvorak), American Economic Journal: Microeconomics, 16, 232–258, 2024, [link] [WP].

Committee Decision-Making under the Threat of Leaks (with Volker Hahn), Journal of Politics, 85 (3), 1107-1122, 2023, [link] [WP].

Delegation to a Group (with Moritz Janas), Management Science, 67, 3714-3743, 2021, [link] [article].

Buying Supermajorities in the Lab (with Maik T. Schneider), Games and Economic Behavior, 127, 113-154, 2021, [link] [article].

Honesty and Self-Selection into Cheap Talk (with Urs Fischbacher and Maik T. Schneider), The Economic Journal, 130, 2468–2496, 2020, [link] [article].

How Transparency Kills Information Aggregation: Theory and Experiment (with Niall Hughes), American Economic Journal: Microeconomics, 10, 181-209, 2018, [link] [WP].

Choosing a Partner for Social Exchange: Charitable Giving as a Signal of Trustworthiness (with Wojtek Przepiorka), Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, 129, 157-171, 2016, [link] [WP].

Pro-Social Missions and Worker Motivation: An Experimental Study (with Michael Kosfeld), Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, 100, 99-110, 2014, [link] [WP].

Can You Trust the Good Guys? Trust Within and Between Groups with Different Missions (with Michael Kosfeld), Economics Letters, 121, 400-404, 2013, [link] [WP].

Charitable Giving as a Signal of Trustworthiness: Disentangling the Signaling Benefits of Altruistic Acts (with Wojtek Przepiorka), Evolution & Human Behavior, 34, 139-145, 2013, [link] [WP].

The Effectiveness of Inputs in Primary Education: Insights from Recent Student Surveys for Sub-Saharan Africa (with Katharina Michaelowa and Annika Wechtler), Journal of Development Studies, 45, 1545-1578, 2009, [link].

Other

CO2-Steuer in allen Wählergruppen am populärsten in Kombination mit Klimageld (aber nicht für alle) (with Olexandr Nikolaychuk, Markus Tepe, and Sebastian Hemesath), DIFIS-Impuls 2024/2, 2024, [link].

Social Pensions in Bangladesh (with Heiner Salomon), in: Mapping Global Dynamics of Social Policy (edited by Ivo Mossig and Herbert Obinger), 2023, [link].

Von Fallstricken moralischen Verhaltens und ihrer Bedeutung für die Politik (Rezension zu “Warum es so schwer ist, ein guter Mensch zu sein”, von Armin Falk), in: sozialpolitikblog, 2022, [link].

TV-Based Learning in Bangladesh: Is it Reaching Students? (with Kumar Biswas, T.M. Asaduzzaman, David K. Evans, Deepika Ramachandran, and Shwetlena Sabarwal), Word Bank Policy Brief, 2020, [link].

Education Marginalization in Sub-Saharan Africa (with Katharina Michaelowa), background paper for the 2010 UNESCO EFA Global Monitoring Report, 2009, [link].

Schule in Afrika, VDM, 2008.
 

Randomized Controlled Trials

Improving State Capacity to Target Extreme Poverty: An Evaluation of a Randomized Intervention in Bangladesh (with Viola Asri, Kumar Biswas, Urs Fischbacher, Katharina Michaelowa, and Atonu Rabbani), status: completed, [link].

Improving Equity in Education through Youth Mentoring: An Evaluation of a Randomized Intervention in Colombia (with Diego Amador, Diego Aycinena, Urs Fischbacher, Anna Hochleitner, Andrés Moya, and Guido Schwerdt), status: pilot completed, [link] [program website].
 

Workshops and Conferences

Political Economy: Theory Meets Empirics, Graz, 2024, [program]; (programs of previous years: [online 2021], [Konstanz, 2019], [London 2018], [Konstanz 2017], [Bath 2016], [Konstanz 2015], [Zurich 2014]).

Thurgau Experimental Economics Meeting (theem), Kreuzlingen, 2019, [program]; (programs of previous years: [2018], [2017]).

Behavioral Decision-Making, Konstanz, 2018, [program].

Organizational Economics, Konstanz, 2018, [program].

Repeated Games: Theory and Experiments, Konstanz, 2017, [program].
 

Contact

Electronic

Phone: +49 421 218-58590
Email: sebastian.fehrler@uni-bremen.de
Web: [UniHB] [IZA]

 

Snail Mail

University of Bremen
SOCIUM
Mary-Somerville-Str. 5
D-28359 Bremen