Junya Zhou 周君雅
Assistant Professor in Managerial Economics
Naveen Jindal School of Management
The University of Texas at Dallas
Link to my UTD official page
Email: junya.zhou@utdallas.edu
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Research Interests
Research Interests
Behavioral and Experimental | Strategic Communication | Information Design | Bounded Rationality
I got my Ph.D. in Economics at Purdue University. I am fortunately advised by Dr. Tim Cason, Collin Raymond, David Gill, and Colin Sullivan.
I also hold an M.A. in Economics from Central University of Finance and Economics, and a B.A. in Economics and English Literature from Beijing Foreign Studies University.
Publications
Publications
How cognitive skills affect strategic behavior: Cognitive ability, fluid intelligence and judgment (with David Gill, Zachary Knepper and Victoria Prowse)
Games and Economic Behavior, 149: 82-95, 2025. link
Costly verification and commitment in persuasion. Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, 212:1100-42, 2023. link
Determinants of social capital: the subjective economic status perspective (with Tao Li, Xinye Jin and Yupeng Shi) Economic Research Journal《经济研究》, 2021, 56(01):191-205. link
Working papers
Working papers
Abstract
We investigate how increasing the complexity of the message space, in the presence of limited memory, can reduce misrepresentation in strategic communication. We enrich a standard cheap talk game so that senders must communicate not just a payoff-relevant state, but also payoff-irrelevant attributes correlated with the state. We show that: (i) increasing the set of attributes that may need to be reported (i.e., the complexity of the game) improves the amount of information transmitted in equilibrium, (ii) too much of an increase in complexity leads to a reversal of those gains, (iii) limited memory on the part of players, as well as the relative complexity faced by senders and receivers, drives these changes, and (iv) individuals experience cognitive costs when dealing with complex environments that they are willing to pay to avoid. Our findings demonstrate that the reporting of redundant information may induce equilibria that feature improved outcomes compared to simpler, more direct reporting systems, and point out the importance of complexity when trying to induce truthful information revelation.
Happiness dynamics, reference dependence and motivated beliefs in U.S. presidential elections link
Joint work with Miles Kimball, Collin Raymond, Jiannan Zhou, Fumio Ohtake and Yoshiro Tsutsui
NBER Working Paper, No. w32078
Media Coverage: Featured on VoxEU Column link
Abstract
Leveraging novel happiness data, we show how they can help us understand both reference dependence and motivated beliefs. We provide four new findings: i) happiness responds to changes relative to different reference points in heterogeneous ways---subjects exhibit loss neutrality with respect to the political status quo (i.e., the incumbent presidential party), but hedonic loss aversion with respect to the expected electoral outcome; ii) the speed of hedonic (i.e., reference point) adaptation to status quo changes is much slower than to surprises; iii) beliefs impact happiness in a nonlinear way; and iv) both ``objective'' and motivated subjective beliefs influence happiness reactions.
Work in Progress
Work in Progress
Complex Communication in Negotiations
Joint with Gary Bolton and Zhongheng Qiao
Teaching
Teaching
BA 3300. Advanced Topics in Capitalism: Ideas and Challenges That Shape Our World
BA 3300. Advanced Topics in Capitalism: Ideas and Challenges That Shape Our World
2024 Spring (4.7/5)
2024 Fall (4.86/5)
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