Plasmas and Controlled Nuclear Fusion

Contains reports on two research projects.U. S. Atomic Energy Commission (Contract AT(11-1)-3070

Applied Plasma Research

Contains reports on two research projects.National Science Foundation (Grant GK-28282X1)National Science Foundation (Grant GK-33843

Plasmas and Controlled Nuclear Fusion

Contains reports on three research projects.U. S. Atomic Energy Commission (Contract AT(11-1)-3070

Does Increasing Risk Widen Gender Gaps?

We examine the response to an exogenous change in the risk profile of an important educational choice – requesting a regrade. We demonstrate how ostensibly gender-neutral policies can generate gaps across men and women because they differ in their perceptions of risk. Specifically, we show that an exogenous shift in the risk of requesting a regrade augmented the regrade request gap by nearly 100 percent. We show that this has consequential implications for students through its impact on their grade points. These findings reveal how gender differences identified in the lab manifest when men and women make real world decisions

Strong "quantum" chaos in the global ballooning mode spectrum of three-dimensional plasmas

The spectrum of ideal magnetohydrodynamic (MHD) pressure-driven (ballooning) modes in strongly nonaxisymmetric toroidal systems is difficult to analyze numerically owing to the singular nature of ideal MHD caused by lack of an inherent scale length. In this paper, ideal MHD is regularized by using a $k$-space cutoff, making the ray tracing for the WKB ballooning formalism a chaotic Hamiltonian billiard problem. The minimum width of the toroidal Fourier spectrum needed for resolving toroidally localized ballooning modes with a global eigenvalue code is estimated from the Weyl formula. This phase-space-volume estimation method is applied to two stellarator cases.Comment: 4 pages typeset, including 2 figures. Paper accepted for publication in Phys. Rev. Letter

Plasmas and Controlled Nuclear Fusion

Contains research objectives, summary of research and reports on six research projects.U. S. Atomic Energy Commission (Contract AT(11-1)-3070

The effect of job loss on risky financial decision-making

Job loss is a common and disruptive life event. It is known to have numerous long-term negative effects on financial, health, and social outcomes. While the negative effects of becoming unemployed on health and well-being are well understood, the influence of job loss on financial decisions has received little attention. Across a large-scale survey $(N=37,854)$, spending data from a bank $(N=404,470)$, and two online experiments (total $N=1,403)$, we find that job loss increases financial risk-taking. First, in survey data, job loss is associated with elevated levels of self-reported financial risk-taking and lottery ticket purchases. Next, using administrative data from a large bank, we find consistent causal evidence of the influence of job loss on gambling spending. Although total spending decreases after job loss, gambling spending is less affected than our control categories. Finally, we turn to two incentive-compatible manipulations of job loss operationalized in a lab setting. We find that this experimental manipulation increases the take-up of financial risks. The current finding that job loss increases financial risk-taking could accentuate long-term negative financial effects of job loss

Plasma Dynamics

Contains research objectives and summary of research on eighteen research projects split into seven sections and reports on four research projects.U.S. Atomic Energy Commission (Contract AT(l1-1)-3070)National Science Foundation (Grant GK-37979X1