WPI - Computer Science, MS Thesis Presentation Yahel Nachum "Calendar Visualizations of Money Earlier or Later Questions

WPI – COMPUTER SCIENCE DEPARTMENT

MS THESIS PRESENTATION

 Calendar Visualizations of Money Earlier or Later Questions

Yahel Nachum

MS Student

WPI – Computer Science Department

Thursday, April 20, 2023

Time: :3:00 p.m. – 4:00 p.m.

Location: Unity Hall 320G

Advisor: Professor Daniel Reichman

Reader: Professor Neil Heffernan

 

Abstract:

 

With the past year of high inflation and the recent increasing unpredictability of the future economic market, making the right financial choice is important. People struggle with delayed financial gratification, making it difficult to save. If given the choice between receiving a financial reward at an earlier or later date, the reward on the later date would need to be larger for the options to appear equivalent; the percent change between the earlier and later reward amounts is the discount rate.

In the field of economics, textual questions have been used to research different aspects of discounting and financial decision-making. Independently, the field of visualizations has shown that layouts and interaction styles affect decision-making. Through the novel conversion of textual financial questions into calendar visualizations, we explore the effects of visualization on discounting by designing and implementing a modular survey in React and hosting it on Amazon Web Services to gather discounting data.