Ability or luck: A systematic review of interpersonal attributions of success

The role of luck in success has a relatively minor, albeit consistent history in academic discourse, with a striking lack of literature engaging with notions of luck within occupational environments. Elucidating why people attribute their own success to luck over ability has predominated in the literature, with interpersonal attributions receiving less attention. Here, we center on systematically summarizing the evidence on interpersonal attributions of success as a function of ability or luck, with a particular focus on whether these differs by gender and race. The perception of the success of others from different sociodemographic groups, and how it is attributed, is a crucial leverage point for inclusion and diversity. Particularly as women and ethnic groups continue to be systematically disadvantaged in the workforce. Ignoring the role of luck conceals and augments privilege, even if not deliberately or consciously invoked. Using the Prisma protocol, this review offers evidence from experiments, published between 1970 and 2020, derived from five electronic bibliographic databases; Business Source Complete; PsychINFO; Scopus; Web of Science; and Google Scholar. There were a limited number of studies on gender that found an effect, but with few exceptions, the papers that pertain to race converged on the understanding that interpersonal attributions of success were predicated on this immutable factor. Such that black individuals were more often viewed as lucky in their success and less able, which translates to lesser opportunity and reward. Decades of research have pointed to individuals making systematic attribution errors in success by gender and race; this review only partially substantiates this consensus and provides narrow support for the view that those believed to be the most talented in society may merely be the luckiest. We add to evidence that context matters.

When the disposition effect proves to be rational: Experimental evidence from professional traders

The disposition effect is a behavioural finance anomaly that has been observed in many populations including non-professional investors as well as professional investors and has been linked to reduced trading performance. However, the majority of studies to date have looked at the disposition effect in the context of non-mean reverting markets. We conducted a within-subject experiment with n = 193 professional traders, to examine how the tendency towards the disposition effect varies across decision-making for mean reverting securities and non-mean reverting securities. In addition, we consider whether a simple informational intervention that makes the disposition effect salient can alter decision-making. Overall, we find that prior to the intervention the traders exhibit the disposition effect in the direction that aligns with profit maximisation goals suggesting that they are acting rational. For decisions on mean reverting securities the traders tend to make decisions in the direction of the disposition effect, which is rational given their mean reverting properties. We also find that the informational intervention is effective in changing the level of the disposition effect observed and decision-making, regardless of whether traders are considering decisions over mean reverting or non-mean reverting securities. Further, we provide evidence that our simple informational intervention improves trader returns when making decisions on non-mean reverting securities. In contrast, it has a negative impact when utilised for mean reverting securities. Our study highlights the power of simple interventions to make disproportionately large changes to decision-making regardless of whether they are in our best interests, and their beneficial role only when the context is right.

People versus machines: The impact of being in an automatable job on Australian worker's mental health and life satisfaction

This study explores the effect on mental health and life satisfaction of working in an automatable job. We utilise an Australian panel dataset (HILDA), and take a fixed effects linear regression approach, to relate a person being in automatable work to proxies of their wellbeing. Overall, we find evidence that automatable work has a small, detrimental impact on the mental health and life satisfaction of workers within some industries, particularly those with higher levels of job automation risk, such as manufacturing. Furthermore, we find no strong trends to suggest that any particular demographic group is disproportionately impacted across industries. These findings are robust to a variety of specifications. We also find evidence of adaptation to these effects after one-year tenure on the job, indicating a limited role for firm policy.

Can meaning make cents? Making the meaning of work salient for US manufacturing workers

We conducted a field experiment in a small electronics manufacturing firm in the US with the specific aim to improve minutes worked, punctuality, tardiness and safety checks. Our intervention was to put posters on the production floor on a random day, which made salient to the blue-collar employees the meaning and importance of their job, which comprised of routine repetitive tasks, in a before and after design. Overall, the intervention was a success with positive and significant effects consistently found for the outcomes both immediately after the experiment finished (+3 days) and also more than two weeks after (+15 days). Our study highlights it is possible to motivate blue collar manual workers intrinsically by drawing attention to the meaning of their work.

People versus machines: introducing the HIRE framework

The use of Artificial Intelligence (AI) in the recruitment process is becoming a more common method for organisations to hire new employees. Despite this, there is little consensus on whether AI should have widespread use in the hiring process, and in which contexts. In order to bring more clarity to research findings, we propose the HIRE (Human, (Artificial) Intelligence, Recruitment, Evaluation) framework with the primary aim of evaluating studies which investigate how Artificial Intelligence can be integrated into the recruitment process with respect to gauging whether AI is an adequate, better, or worse substitute for human recruiters. We illustrate the simplicity of this framework by conducting a systematic literature review on the empirical studies assessing AI in the recruitment process, with 22 final papers included. The review shows that AI is equal to or better than human recruiters when it comes to efficiency and performance. We also find that AI is mostly better than humans in improving diversity. Finally, we demonstrate that there is a perception among candidates and recruiters that AI is worse than humans. Overall, we conclude based on the evidence, that AI is equal to or better to humans when utilised in the hiring process, however, humans hold a belief of their own superiority. Our aim is that future authors adopt the HIRE framework when conducting research in this area to allow for easier comparability, and ideally place the HIRE framework outcome of AI being better, equal, worse, or unclear in the abstract.

Automation and the changing nature of work

This study identifies the job attributes, and in particular skills and abilities, which predict the likelihood a job is recently automatable drawing on the Josten and Lordan (2020) classification of automatability, EU labour force survey data and a machine learning regression approach. We find that skills and abilities which relate to non-linear abstract thinking are those that are the safest from automation. We also find that jobs that require ‘people’ engagement interacted with ‘brains’ are also less likely to be automated. The skills that are required for these jobs include soft skills. Finally, we find that jobs that require physically making objects or physicality more generally are most likely to be automated unless they involve interaction with ‘brains’ and/or ‘people’.

The impact of mental health support for the chronically ill on hospital utilisation: Evidence from the UK

Individuals with common mental disorders (CMDs) such as depression and anxiety frequently have co-occurring long-term physical health conditions (LTCs) and this co-occurrence is associated with higher hospital utilisation. Psychological treatment for CMDs may reduce healthcare utilisation through better management of the LTC, but there is little previous research. We examined the impact of psychological treatment delivered under the nationwide Improving Access to Psychological Therapies (IAPT) programme in England on hospital utilisation 12-months after the end of IAPT treatment. We examined three types of hospital utilisation: Inpatient treatment, Outpatient treatment and Emergency Room attendance. We examined individuals with Chronic Obstructive Pulmonary Disease (COPD) (n = 816), Diabetes (n = 2813) or Cardiovascular Disease (CVD) (n = 4115) who received psychological treatment between April 2014 and March 2016. IAPT episode data was linked to hospital utilisation data which went up to March 2017. Changes in the probability of hospital utilisation were compared to a matched control sample for each LTC. Individuals in the control sample received IAPT treatment between April 2017 and March 2018. Compared to the control sample, the treated sample had significant reductions in the probability of all three types of hospital utilisation, for all three LTCs 12-months after the end of IAPT treatment. Reductions in utilisation of Emergency Room, Outpatient and non-elective Inpatient treatment were also observed immediately following the end of psychological treatment, and 6-months after, for individuals with diabetes and CVD, compared to the matched sample. These findings suggest that psychological interventions for CMDs delivered to individuals with co-occurring long-term chronic conditions may reduce the probability of utilisation of hospital services. Our results support the roll-out of psychological treatment aimed at individuals who have co-occurring CMDs and long-term chronic conditions.

The interaction between personality and health policy: Empirical evidence from the UK smoking bans

We investigate whether responses to the UK public places smoking ban depend on personality. Drawing on individual level panel data from the British Household Panel Survey (BHPS) we exploit variation in the timing and location of these bans to establish their overall effect on smoking outcomes, and how this differs by personality. We measure personality using the Big Five personality traits. We are particularly interested in conscientiousness, given the evidence that it is a good proxy for self-control. Overall, we find that a one standard deviation increase in conscientiousness leads to a 1.4 percentage point reduction in the probability of smoking after the ban. Notably, this is the only Big Five personality trait that interacts with the smoking ban. This finding is very robust to different specifications.

People versus machines in the UK: Minimum wages, labor reallocation and automatable jobs

This study follows the Lordan and Neumark (2018) analysis for the US, and examines whether minimum wage increases affect employment opportunities in automatable jobs in the UK for low-skilled low-wage workers. Overall, I find that increasing the minimum wage decreases the share of automatable employment held by low-skilled low-wage workers, and increases the likelihood that workers in automatable jobs become dis-employed. On aggregate the effect size is modest, but I also provide evidence that these effects are larger in more recent years. The study also highlights significant heterogeneity by industry and demographic group, including more substantive adverse effects for older low-skilled workers in manufacturing, as well as effects at the intensive margin.

Do All Activities "Weigh" Equally? How Different Physical Activities Differ as Predictors of Weight

In Britain, it is recommended that, to stay healthy, adults should do 150 minutes of moderate-intensity physical activity every week. The recommendations provided by the U.K. government, however, remain silent in regard to the type of activity that should be done. Using the annual Health Survey for England we compare how different types of physical activities predict a person's weight. In particular, we consider clinically measured body mass index and waist circumference. We document mean slopes emanating from ordinary least squares regressions with these measures as the dependent variables. We show that individuals who walk at a brisk or fast pace are more likely to have a lower weight when compared to individuals doing other activities. Additionally, we highlight that the association between physical activity and weight is stronger for females and individuals over the age of 50. Our overall conclusions are robust to a number of specifications.

Education and health knowledge: evidence from UK compulsory schooling reform

We investigate if there is a causal link between education and health knowledge using data from the 1984/85 and 1991/92 waves of the UK Health and Lifestyle Survey (HALS). Uniquely, the survey asks respondents what they think are the main causes of ten common health conditions, and we compare these answers to those given by medical professionals to form an index of health knowledge. For causal identification we use increases in the UK minimum school leaving age in 1947 (from 14 to 15) and 1972 (from 15 to 16) to provide exogenous variation in education. These reforms predominantly induced adolescents who would have left school to stay for one additionally mandated year. OLS estimates suggest that education significantly increases health knowledge, with a one-year increase in schooling increasing the health knowledge index by 15% of a standard deviation. In contrast, estimates from instrumental-variable models show that increased schooling due to the education reforms did not significantly affect health knowledge. This main result is robust to numerous specification tests and alternative formulations of the health knowledge index. Further research is required to determine whether there is also no causal link between higher levels of education - such as post-school qualifications - and health knowledge.

Weight perceptions, weight control and income: an analysis using British data

The aim of this paper is to better understand one of the mechanisms underlying the income-obesity relationship so that effective policy interventions can be developed. Our approach involves analysing data on approximately 9000 overweight British adults from between 1997 and 2002. We estimate the effect of income on the probability that an overweight individual correctly recognises their overweight status and the effect of income on the probability that an overweight individual attempts to lose weight. The results suggest that high income individuals are more likely to recognise their unhealthy weight status, and conditional on this correct weight perception, more likely to attempt weight loss. For example, it is estimated that overweight high income males are 15 percentage-points more likely to recognise their overweight status than overweight low income males, and overweight high income males are 10 percentage-points more likely to be trying to lose weight. An implication of these results is that more public education on what constitutes overweight and the dangers associated with being overweight is needed, especially in low income neighbourhoods.

Unplanned pregnancy and the impact on sibling health outcomes

This work considers whether planning matters with respect to the effect of a new sibling on another siblings' health. Objective health outcomes are observed before and after a new addition to the family. To date, the literature on family size has focused on a quality-quantity trade-off; the more children in a family, the less resources devoted to each child. We present a theoretical framework which highlights that the quantity-quality trade-off may only be relevant in the case of an unplanned sibling. We also suggest that a planned sibling may result in health gains for the other children. We use two waves of data for more than 1800 children from Peru from the Young Lives Project to test our hypothesis. The data relate to the children at 1 and 5 years. For health outcomes, height for age and weight for age Z are considered. The results highlight significant negative independent effects on height for age when an unplanned sibling is added to the household. In addition, we find positive sibling effects on height for age when a planned sibling arrives. We find only small planning effects for weight for age. We view our hypothesis as a pathway that can further explain the quantity-quality trade-off.

Exploring the relationship between macroeconomic conditions and problem drinking as captured by Google searches in the U.S

There is considerable policy interest in the impact of macroeconomic conditions on health-related behaviours and outcomes. This paper sheds new light on this issue by exploring the relationship between macroeconomic conditions and an indicator of problem drinking derived from state-level data on alcoholism-related Google searches conducted in the US over the period 2004-2011. We find the current recessionary period coincided with an almost 20% increase in alcoholism-related searches. Controlling for state and time-effects, a 5% rise in unemployment is followed in the next 12 months by an approximate 15% increase in searches. The use of Internet searches to inform on health-related behaviours and outcomes is in its infancy; but we suggest that the data provides important real-time information for policy-makers and can help to overcome the under-reporting in surveys of sensitive information.

Income inequality and mental health--empirical evidence from Australia

The causal association between absolute income and health is well-established; however, the relationship between income inequality and health is not. The conclusions from the received studies vary across the region or country studied and/or the methodology employed. Using the Household, Income and Labour Dynamics in Australia panel survey, this paper investigates the relationship between mental health and inequality in Australia. A variety of income inequality indices are calculated to test both the income inequality and relative deprivation hypotheses. We find that mental health is only adversely affected by the presence of relative deprivation to a very small degree. In addition, we do not find support for the income inequality hypothesis. Importantly, our results are robust to a number of sensitivity analyses.

Does donor assistance for HIV respond to media pressure?

HIV/AIDS is a heavily mediatised disease. In this article, we test whether media attention is affecting donors' disbursement of aid for HIV to African countries. We use information available on the number of articles and press documents on HIV issues and other health concerns published in donor countries to construct a proxy of media coverage. This proxy is then included as an explanatory variable in a regression of aid for HIV to Africa. After controlling for several donor characteristics, we find that greater media coverage increases aid disbursement. This may be good news for the HIV campaign but may result in displacement effects to the extent that other diseases that cause greater mortality and morbidity receive less media coverage than HIV and thus less health aid.

Socioeconomic status and health outcomes in a developing country

Although the relationship between socioeconomic status (SES) and health is well documented for developed countries, less evidence has been presented for developing countries. The aim of this paper is to analyse this relationship at the household level for Fiji, a developing country in the South Pacific, using original household survey data. To allow for the endogeneity of SES status in the household health production function, we utilize a simultaneous equation approach where estimates are achieved by full information maximum likelihood. By restricting our sample to one, relatively small island, and including area and district hospital effects, physical geography effects are unpacked from income effects. We measure SES, as permanent income which is constructed using principal components analysis. An alternative specification considers transitory household income. We find that a 1% increase in wealth (our measure of permanent income) would lead to a 15% decrease in the probability of an incapacitating illness occurring intra-household. Although the presence of a strong relationship indicates that relatively small improvements in SES status can significantly improve health at the household level, it is argued that the design of appropriate policy would also require an understanding of the various mechanisms through which the relationship operates.

Discrimination makes me sick! An examination of the discrimination-health relationship

The attitudes of the general British population towards Muslims changed post 2001, and this change led to a significant increase in Anti-Muslim discrimination. We use this exogenous attitude change to estimate the causal impact of increased discrimination on a range of objective and subjective health outcomes. The difference-in-differences estimates indicate that discrimination worsens blood pressure, cholesterol, BMI and self-assessed general health. Thus, discrimination is a potentially important determinant of the large racial and ethnic health gaps observed in many countries. We also investigate the pathways through which discrimination impacts upon health, and find that discrimination has a negative effect on employment, perceived social support, and health-producing behaviours. Crucially, our results hold for different control groups and model specifications.

Are there treatment variations in triage outcomes across out-of-hours co-ops?

BACKGROUND

This study considers the factors that affect service provision for individuals who present to out-of-hours (OOH) primary care services in the Republic of Ireland and Northern Ireland. The organisations under consideration are known as OOH co-ops. Specifically, an individual can potentially receive one of four services: nurse advice, doctor advice, a treatment centre consultation or a home visit.

AIM

The principal aim was to investigate whether service provision was consistent across co-ops once patient characteristics, patient complaints and other covariates were controlled for. In this paper, service provision was seen as a necessary but not sufficient condition for quality.

METHODS

A multinomial logit approach was used to model the choice between the three services offered by co-ops.

RESULTS

The results indicate that service provision was relatively homogenous across co-ops.

CONCLUSIONS

Quality was consistent across co-ops in terms of service provision. Therefore the next step is to consider whether quality within the treatment received varies. Nevertheless, the result provides some support for using OOH co-ops as a means to provide OOH primary care.

What determines a patient’s treatment? Evidence from out of hours primary care co-op data in the Republic of Ireland

This study explores consistency in healthcare. It investigates whether vulnerable groups in the population receive the most appropriate care. This is achieved by considering the case study of individuals who present to out of hours (OOH) primary care services in the Republic of Ireland with gastroenteritis. Specifically an individual can potentially receive four services; nurse advice, doctor advice, a treatment centre consultation or a home visit. Results show that service choice is influenced by patient, call and seasonal characteristics to varying degrees. Patient symptoms are the primary driver of the type of service the patients receives. Results also indicate that the OOH primary care facilities individual characteristics do not affect service choice. This suggests a degree of consistent care across these organisations. It also provides evidence that service choice is exogenous to the organisation.