skip to main content
US FlagAn official website of the United States government
dot gov icon
Official websites use .gov
A .gov website belongs to an official government organization in the United States.
https lock icon
Secure .gov websites use HTTPS
A lock ( lock ) or https:// means you've safely connected to the .gov website. Share sensitive information only on official, secure websites.

Explore Research Products in the PAR
It may take a few hours for recently added research products to appear in PAR search results.


Title: Cashing out: digital payments and resilience post-demonetization
We explore how different segments of the population in India coped, in terms of business transactions, with the sudden decision of the government to stop accepting certain legal tender bills, popularly referred to as demonetization. The decision to demonetize was followed by a large-scale push for adoption of digital payments. Behavioral changes during such shocks do have specific nuances different from those during normal times. Using the concept of resilience, we examine the drivers of behavior change that differentiated those that were able to make the switch compared to those that weren't. Those technologically more adept were more resilient to the shock, in terms of being able to navigate through new means of exchange. Also, rural poor showed greater resilience than urban poor, a function of the level of homogeneity in those societies with respect to technology adoption and the ability to cope without changing cash practices. We also found that those who had bank accounts and relied largely on those accounts for daily transactions, without being aware of alternate modes, were impacted the most. From a policy perspective this research cautions against unintended consequences of purely access-driven incentives to behavior change, advocating instead a holistic approach.  more » « less
Award ID(s):
1733634 1734014
PAR ID:
10085661
Author(s) / Creator(s):
; ; ;
Date Published:
Journal Name:
Proceeding of ICTD 2019
Page Range / eLocation ID:
1 to 16
Format(s):
Medium: X
Sponsoring Org:
National Science Foundation
More Like this
  1. ; ; (, Risk Analysis)
    Abstract The concept of “resilience analytics” has recently been proposed as a means to leverage the promise of big data to improve the resilience of interdependent critical infrastructure systems and the communities supported by them. Given recent advances in machine learning and other data‐driven analytic techniques, as well as the prevalence of high‐profile natural and man‐made disasters, the temptation to pursue resilience analytics without question is almost overwhelming. Indeed, we find big data analytics capable to support resilience to rare, situational surprises captured in analytic models. Nonetheless, this article examines the efficacy of resilience analytics by answering a single motivating question: Can big data analytics help cyber–physical–social (CPS) systems adapt to surprise? This article explains the limitations of resilience analytics when critical infrastructure systems are challenged by fundamental surprises never conceived during model development. In these cases, adoption of resilience analytics may prove either useless for decision support or harmful by increasing dangers during unprecedented events. We demonstrate that these dangers are not limited to a single CPS context by highlighting the limits of analytic models during hurricanes, dam failures, blackouts, and stock market crashes. We conclude that resilience analytics alone are not able to adapt to the very events that motivate their use and may, ironically, make CPS systems more vulnerable. We present avenues for future research to address this deficiency, with emphasis on improvisation to adapt CPS systems to fundamental surprise. 
    more » « less
  2. ; (, Travel Behaviour and Society)
    With the advent of new mobility modes and technologies, we have seen meaningful changes in travel behavior. One such new mobility mode is on-demand transit. The Metropolitan Atlanta Rapid Transit Authority deployed its own on-demand transit system, dubbed MARTA Reach, in March of 2022. This paper provides an evaluation of the characteristics of two groups of people related to MARTA Reach: those who were interested in it and used it and those who were interested in it but did not use it. In addition, this paper explores the factors that influence membership in each of those two groups using a binary logit model, revealing the underlying characteristics that are linked with the decision to use or not use the service given prior interest. The findings show that simply providing more service has the strongest effect on adoption. Among 561 survey respondents, 426 expressed that the service area for MARTA Reach was too limited for their needs. Modeling results support this finding, in addition to the following strong predictors of on-demand transit adoption: 1) being a frequent transit user, 2) being satisfied with the current state of fixed-route transit service, 3) being part of a low-income household, 4) living within an on-demand transit service area, and 5) being younger. Understanding these group characteristics and underlying factors can help guide future efforts to provide on-demand transit service, such as by targeting the market segments that share features with the underlying factors that are shown herein to be linked with on-demand transit adoption. 
    more » « less
  3. ; ; (, IEEE Transactions on Dependable and Secure Computing)
    This is one of the first accounts for the security analysis of consumer immersive Virtual Reality (VR) systems. This work breaks new ground, coins new terms, and constructs proof of concept implementations of attacks related to immersive VR. Our work used the two most widely adopted immersive VR systems, the HTC Vive, and the Oculus Rift. More specifically, we were able to create attacks that can potentially disorient users, turn their Head Mounted Display (HMD) camera on without their knowledge, overlay images in their field of vision, and modify VR environmental factors that force them into hitting physical objects and walls. Finally, we illustrate through a human participant deception study the success of being able to exploit VR systems to control immersed users and move them to a location in physical space without their knowledge. We term this the Human Joystick Attack. We conclude our work with future research directions and ways to enhance the security of these systems. 
    more » « less
  4. ; ; ; (, Geographical Review)
    With climate extreme events increasing in frequency and intensity in Malawi, the future of local food production faces serious threats, necessitating renewed efforts to build the adaptive capabilities of the majority poor smallholder farmers. In this context, seed security is critical to improving rural livelihoods and agrobiodiversity; however, knowledge of its role in climate change resilience is sparse. Drawing insights from vulnerability and resilience literature, this paper examines the role of seed security in enhancing climate change resilience in northern Malawi. Using a cross-sectional survey of 1,090 smallholder farmers and applying logistic regression analysis, the study found that households that are seed-secure were significantly more likely to report stronger resilience to climate change than those that were not seed-secure, even after controlling for theoretically relevant variables (OR = 1.89; p < .01). Other noteworthy predictors of climate change resilience included level of education, wealth, agroecological practice, and seed sources. Based on the findings, we advocate for promoting seed security as part of broader localized and place-specific action plans to foster resilience to climate change in agricultural regions. 
    more » « less
  5. ; (, Proceedings of the ... ASME Design Engineering Technical Conferences)
    Understanding and integrating a user’s decision-making process into design and implementation strategies for clean energy technologies may lead to higher product adoption rates and ultimately increased impacts, particularly for those products that require a change in habit or behavior. To evaluate the key attributes that formulate a user’s decision-making behavior to adopt a new clean technology, this study presents the application of the Theory of Planned Behavior, a method to quantify the main psychological attributes that make up a user’s intention for health and environmental behaviors. This theory was applied to the study of biomass cookstoves. Surveys in two rural communities in Honduras and Uganda were conducted to evaluate households’ intentions regarding adoption of improved biomass cookstoves. Multiple ordered logistic regressions method presented the most statistically significant results for the collected data of the case studies. Baseline results showed users had a significant positive mindset to replace their traditional practices. In Honduras, users valued smoke reduction more than other attributes and in average the odds for a household with slightly higher attitude toward reducing smoke emissions were 2.1 times greater to use a clean technology than someone who did not value smoke reduction as much. In Uganda, less firewood consumption was the most important attribute and on average the odds for households were 1.9 times more to adopt a clean technology to save fuel than someone who did not value fuelwood saving as much. After two months of using a cookstove, in Honduras, households’ perception of the feasibility of replacing traditional stoves, or perceived behavioral control, slightly decreased suggesting that as users became more familiar with the clean technology they perceived less hindrances to change their traditional habits. Information such as this could be utilized for design of the technologies that require user behavior changes to be effective. 
    more » « less
  • Citation Formats
  • MLA
  • APA
  • Chicago
  • BibTeX
  • Save / Share this Record
  • Send to Email