About
Jennifer is a graduate student in economics, studying labour markets. Her current research agenda is primarily focused on two topics: (i) how policymakers can reduce job search frictions to help workers find jobs they are well-suited for as easily as possible and (ii) measuring social norms and attitudes toward work and how these feed into labour market power. Jennifer is currently a PhD candidate in the Duke University Economics Department. She previously obtained a BA in Economics from Davidson College.
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About
Jack Calland is a Research Associate at J-PAL Africa. He works on projects with the MBRG's Professor Kate Orkin studying interventions aimed at tackling the problem of (youth) unemployment. Jack has an MSc in Development Studies from the London School of Economics & Political Science, awarded in the First Class and with the Prize for Best Performance, and a BCom in Politics, Philosophy, and Economics, with First-Class Honours in Economics, from the University Cape Town. Before joining J-PAL, he worked in the finance and digital policy sectors in Johannesburg and London.
About
Andrea Kiss, a behavioral-labor economist, specializes in conducting experiments (lab, online, and field) to explore the impact of biased beliefs on labor markets. Her most recent work focuses on job search behavior and human capital investment.
As a Postdoctoral Fellow at Carnegie Mellon University's Social and Decision Sciences Department, Andrea teaches “Causal Inference,” a course dedicated to observational data methods, and “Behavioral Economics of Poverty and Development,” a course equipping students with behavioral policy tools to mitigate poverty.
Outside academia, Andrea enjoys performing improvisational comedy at a local theatre.
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For more information about Andrea's work, please visit her website: https://www.andreakiss.net/
About
Jessica Nicklin is a Research Assistant for the MBRG. She works with Kate Orkin in advising the South African Presidency on the design of their social protection policies (particularly social grants), as well as helping with research on interventions aimed at addressing youth unemployment in South Africa. Jessica has completed an undergraduate degree in Psychology and Economics and an honours degree in Economics at the University of Cape Town (UCT), both of which were awarded with distinction. She is currently finishing her masters degree in Applied Economics at UCT. Prior to her role as a Research Assistant, Jessica worked as a policy intern for the Girls Education and Empowerment Team at J-PAL Africa.
About
Rob is an economist studying labour markets in developing economies, particularly how to reduce search and matching frictions to increase employment, earnings and productivity. He also studies how labour markets intersect with government policies on income support and public works employment. My two secondary research agendas are on human capital and on methods and measurement. Rob is currently an assistant professor in the Duke University Economics Department and an affiliate at the Poverty Action Lab. He previously worked as a Postdoctoral Researcher in the World Bank's Development Research Group and studied at the University of Michigan and University of Cape Town.
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Alice is currently working as a Research Assistant for the Mind and Behaviour Research Group (MBRG) at the Blavatnik School of Government. Alice has an MA (Hons) in Economics from the University of Edinburgh and an MSc in Economics for Development from the University of Oxford. She previously completed Teach First and worked as an Economics teacher at a sixth form college in London. Alice has also worked as a researcher on Oxford Policy Management's Extreme Poverty Consortium. Her research interests are in the area of Development Economics, with a specific focus on gender, labour markets and human capital.
Contact
Email: alice.cahill@qeh.ox.ac.uk
About
John is a DPhil Student in the Departmet of Economics at the University of Oxford. Previously, John was a Research Assistant in Development Economics at the Mind and Behaviour Research Group at the Centre for the Study of African Economies, University of Oxford. They have also held research assistantships at MIT in theoretical econometrics and envirodevonomics, and continue to provide research assistance at the UBI Center. They hold an MASc in development economics from MIT and a BA in economics/econometrics and a BA in Korean studies from the University of Sydney.
Their research interests include the application of computational microeconometrics and machine learning to development economics.
Contact
john.walker@economics.ox.ac.uk
About
Brynde has worked in development policy research in South Africa and Ghana for five years.
She is passionate about using rigorous academic evidence to evaluate, design and implement development policies that improve the lives of people living in poverty. Most recently, Brynde was a research assistant at the Mind and Behaviour Research Group, based in the Centre for the Study of African Economies (CSAE) in Oxford. She has primarily worked on projects relating to labour markets, social protection, education, behaviour and mental health. Brynde's primary research interests are using the tools from applied empirical microeconomics to understand the intersection between human capital and behaviour.
Brynde is an Oxford-Wolfson-Marriot Scholar.
Contact
Email: brynde.kreft@bsg.ox.ac.uk
About
Marc Witte is a tenure-track Assistant Professor in the Economics Department (School of Business and Economics) at VU Amsterdam and a Research Fellow at the Tinbergen Institute. Previously, Marc was a Postdoctoral Associate at NYU Abu Dhabi and received his DPhil in Economics from the University of Oxford. His research interests are in development economics, labour economics, and the economics of networks. His affiliated work within the research group mainly focuses on research in meta-analysis, including examining the effect of mental health interventions on economic outcomes.
Contact
Email: mjw20@nyu.edu
Personal website here
About
Lukas is an Assistant Professor in Economics at Guanghua School of Management at Peking University and a visitor at the Centre for the Study of African Economies. He leads the research on labor economics at the Mind and Behaviour Research Group. He investigates how (biased) beliefs and labor market frictions affect job-seekers and firms in urban labor markets in developing countries. One forthcoming publication examines how income shocks affect the suicide rate in Indonesia. New work examines the role of information for inclusive hiring decisions in Ethiopia and of knowledge about one’s own ability in job search in South Africa.
Lukas previously held the post of a Postdoctoral Research Fellow at the Blavatnik School of Government, University of Oxford. He holds a DPhil in Economics from the University of Oxford. He previously obtained a MPhil in Economics from the University of Oxford and a BSc in International Economics from the University of Tübingen.
Contact
Email: Lukas.hensel@gsm.pku.edu.cn
Click here for personal website
