TY - RPRT A1 - Traxler, Christian A1 - Altmann, Steffen A1 - Weinschenk, Philip T1 - Deadlines and Memory Limitations N2 - This paper studies the behavioral consequences of deadlines. In cooperation with a dental clinic, we conduct two natural field experiments that exogenously vary deadlines and associated rewards for arranging check-up appointments. Our data show strong and systematic effects of deadlines on patients’ behavior. Imposing relatively tight deadlines induces patients to act earlier and at a persistently higher frequency than without a deadline. Several of our findings suggest that individuals’ responses to deadlines are shaped by limitations in memory and attention. KW - Deadlines KW - Memory limitations KW - limited attention KW - field experiment Y1 - 2020 UR - https://hertieschool-f4e6.kxcdn.com/fileadmin/5_WhoWeAre/1_People_directory/Faculty_downloads/Traxler/Publications/ATW_Deadlines.pdf N1 - Also published here: Steffen Altmann, Christian Traxler, Philipp Weinschenk (2021) Deadlines and Memory Limitations, in: Management Science. https://doi.org/10.1287/mnsc.2021.4227 ER - TY - JOUR A1 - Altmann, Steffen A1 - Traxler, Christian A1 - Weinschenk, Philipp T1 - Deadlines and Memory Limitations JF - Management Science N2 - This paper presents the results of two natural field experiments at a dental clinic. Guided by a simple theoretical model, we exogenously vary deadlines and associated rewards for arranging check-up appointments. Our data show strong and systematic effects of deadlines on patients’ behavior. Imposing deadlines induces patients to act earlier and at a persistently higher frequency than without a deadline. We further document that individuals systematically respond to deadlines, even if these are not tied to explicit rewards. Several of our findings suggest that individuals’ responses to deadlines are shaped by limitations in memory and attention. Our results illustrate that deadlines can be a powerful management tool to encourage timely task completion and to increase the cost effectiveness of performance-contingent rewards. KW - Deadlines KW - memory limitations KW - limited attention KW - field experiment Y1 - 2021 U6 - https://doi.org/10.1287/mnsc.2021.4227 N1 - published online as article in advance on 15.12.2021 VL - 68 IS - 9 SP - 6733 EP - 6750 ER - TY - JOUR A1 - Altmann, Steffen A1 - Traxler, Christian T1 - Nudges at the Dentist JF - European Economic Review N2 - We implement a randomized field experiment to study the impact of reminders on dental health prevention. Patients who are due for a check-up receive no reminder, a neutral reminder postcard, or reminders including additional information on the benefits of prevention. Our results document a strong impact of reminders. Within one month after receiving a reminder, the fraction of patients who make a check-up appointment more than doubles. The effect declines slightly over time, but remains economically and statistically significant. Including additional information in the reminders does not increase response rates. In fact, the neutral reminder has the strongest impact for the overall population as well as for important subgroups of patients. Finally, we document that being exposed to reminders repeatedly does neither strengthen nor weaken their effectiveness. KW - field experiments KW - reminders KW - nudges KW - memory limitations KW - prevention Y1 - 2014 UR - http://nbn-resolving.de/urn/resolver.pl?urn:nbn:de:kobv:b1570-opus4-19694 N1 - This is a post-peer-review, pre-copyedit version of an article published in European Economic Review. The final authenticated version is available online at: DOI 10.1016/j.euroecorev.2014.07.007 VL - 72 SP - 19 EP - 38 ER -