Cooperative Extension Service Communications and Technology Department 3354 1000 E. University Ave. Laramie, WY 82071 (307) 766-2540 • fax (307) 766-3998 • www.uwyo.edu

 

For Immediate Release

 

Contact: Robert Waggener, Editor

Phone: (307) 766-3571

E-mail: robertw@uwyo.edu

 

Date: March 1, 2007

 

UW experimental economics laboratory dedication March 5

            The new experimental economics laboratory in the University of Wyoming’s Department of Agricultural and Applied Economics will be dedicated at 9:30 a.m. Monday, March 5.

            The laboratory is in room 228 in the College of Agriculture. It houses state-of-the-art computer technology for economic experiments in research and teaching, and faculty members and students have been running experiments since midterm last fall.

            UW Vice President for Academic Affairs Myron Allen and College of Agriculture Dean Frank Galey will dedicate the facility, reportedly the first “full-fledged” experimental economics lab in Wyoming.

            Professor Dale Menkhaus and Assistant Professor Mariah Tanner Ehmke will discuss the purpose and potential use of the lab, including research and allowing students to participate in economic experiments. Students will experience such things as how livestock auctions and other trading institutions work and how economic policies affect markets.

            Graduate students Ashley Miller of Laramie and Paul Frankowski of Wethersfield, Conn., are among those already participating in experiments.

            “We were the sellers in a general ag market and learned how producers react to different policy situations,” Miller said.

            Frankowski added, “Experiments like this are one way to guide you toward making decisions and correcting problems.”

            During the dedication, Menkhaus and Tanner Ehmke will lead experiments.

            Tanner Ehmke will also explain the research she is conducting, which involves using economic experiments to measure the use of generosity and control around food and non-food items in the parent-child relationship. The measure is then related to factors that can lead to increased likelihood of children being overweight and obese.

            Tanner Ehmke is collaborating with assistant professors Kari Morgan and Enette Larson-Meyer in the Department of Family and Consumer Sciences.

            Involved in the design of the lab were Menkhaus, Tanner Ehmke, Assistant Professor Chris Bastian, Associate Research Scientist Tom Foulke, and Farm and Ranch Management Specialist John Hewlett, all of the Department of Agricultural and Applied Economics.

            Refreshments will be served at the dedication.

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