What's in a Name: The Psychological and Behavioral Effects of E-Signatures on Individual Decision-Making

press release:

People cherish the symbolic value of their unique hand signature. However, technological advances have led organizations to reject traditional signatures in favor of the efficiency and convenience of e-signatures.

In this Behavioral Insights for Government (BIG) presentation, Eileen Chou will review her research on the role of signatures in public policy. She examines the possibility that e-signatures do not exert the same symbolic weight for people's behavior, exposing a potentially critical, and largely overlooked, problem in public policy uses of e-signatures.

Chou provides evidence that different types of e-signatures have different effects on curbing dishonest behaviors and securing prosocial commitments.

Chou is a social psychologist at the University of Virginia's Batten School of Leadership and Public Policy. She holds a doctorate in management and organization from the Kellogg School of Management at Northwestern University. Her research also discusses how fiscal stress and inequality are related to physical stress, and how social environments generate risk-taking behavior.