The College of Arts and Sciences Fellows Program offers summer fellowships to undergraduates in a College major to participate in research, scholarly, or creative projects under the supervision of a faculty mentor for 10 weeks during the summer.

This summer, Economics major Paige Carmichael worked with Dr. Smita Ramnarain, Assistant Professor of Economics, on a research fellowship. Inspired by the field of feminist economics, they wanted to explore how variables that are used in economics research can be influenced by gender norms even though they are typically considered to be neutral. As such, the influence of gender is often unaccounted for in prevailing studies. Specifically, they focused their summer project on exploring factors of income inequality, time poverty, people’s attitudes towards time as an economic resource, and how the value people place on their time can be connected to gender norms and socialization.

Inspired to pursue her own research on the topic and wanting to contribute to previous studies with similar goals, Paige designed a behavioral field experiment that explores variables of gender and risk/resource allocation, ultimately evaluating risk-taking behavior in terms of how people value and risk their time and how these behaviors might be connected to gender. She is currently working on gaining IRB approval for a 25-question online survey she created, which she is hoping to disseminate to undergraduate students as participants later this fall semester. “Having such a strong mentor as Professor Ramnarain has been beyond helpful in this process,” Paige says, “and I am grateful that the Arts and Sciences Fellowship fosters our work together.”