Sunday, July 28, 2013

Jane Austen, Game Theory and (unrelated) Genetic Tests

Let me flag two recent episodes of the podcast Freakonomics:

- One where we learn that Jane Austen was an (early) Game Theorist. This the subject of the book by Michael Chwe. On a personal note, I have much appreciated the reference by Chwe in the podcast to my good friend Marek Kaminski.

- Another where people are asked "Do you really want to know your future?" Genetic tests can now give you very precise information on your probability of developing a specific disease (for instance, Huntington's). This is an area to which I have recently contributed, together with David Bardey from Bogota, in a paper forthcoming in the Journal of Health Economics. As in the podcast, we look at the circumstances under which individuals do take a genetic tests. We plan to study the "preference for ambiguity" described in the podcast in future research.

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