Chen Zhu 朱晨

China Agricultural University | CAU · College of Economics and Management

个体经济行为的决策机制一直是经济学科的研究重点。遗传经济学是在传统经济学原理基础之上，运用现代遗传学方法分析人类社会经济行为特征的一门新兴交叉学科。通过梳理发现，遗传经济学的学术价值体现在四个主要方面：第一，遗传经济学是对人类行为决策研究由精神层面向物质层面的进一步拓展；第二，遗传经济学能够帮助识别和分离后天社会经济因素与先天禀赋因素对个体的影响；第三，遗传经济学能够帮助进行因果推断；第四，遗传经济学研究结论能够“反哺”自然科学研究。我国当前社会经济的进步与科学技术水平的提升，为遗传经济学研究发展既提出了现实需要，又创造了前提条件。本文为经济学界了解如何从基因角度揭示个体行为决策内在机制提供重要的理论框架和科学工具。

Background Science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM) professionals are regarded as the highly skilled labor force that fosters economic productivity, enterprise innovation, and international competitiveness of a country. This study aims to understand the genetic predisposition to STEM occupations and investigate its associations with...

Purpose Food choices profoundly affect one's dietary, nutritional and health outcomes. Using alcoholic beverages as a case study, the authors assess the potential of genetic data in predicting consumers' food choices combined with conventional socio-demographic data. Design/methodology/approach A discrete choice experiment was conducted to elicit...

作为一门融合社会科学与自然科学的交叉学科，遗传经济学专注于在基因水平上揭示个体经济行为决策的底层逻辑,以基因作为衡量“偏好”的物质基础。遗传经济学的兴起与发展，很大程度得益于21世纪生物科学理论与技术的进步，通过研究基因与经济决策之间的关联性，遗传经济学有望揭示个体差异在决策中的作用，为人类行为的个性化研究提供新的维度。

Background: Social isolation and loneliness pose significant public health challenges globally. The objective of this study is to investigate the association between social isolation, loneliness, and the risk of type 2 diabetes mellitus (T2DM). Methods: 423,503 UK adults from the UK Biobank (UKB) and 13,800 Chinese adults from the China Health and...

The triple burden of malnutrition (hunger or calorie deficiency, hidden hunger or micronutrient deficiency, and overweight/obesity) is closely associated with the ongoing food system transition, which encompasses both nutritional and epidemiological shifts from infectious to non-communicable chronic diseases (World Health Organization, 2016; Fan, 2...

The agricultural subsidy is an important policy instrument that aims to maintain food security and promote agricultural development in several countries. China introduced its first nationwide agricultural subsidy (i.e., the direct grain subsidy) for farmers in 2004. This study examines the impacts of direct grain subsidies on rural residents' food...

Prior research has documented that crowdedness or high-density environments relate to stress and defensive responses of consumers, including reduced satisfaction and avoidance motivations from laboratory evidence. The current study builds on the results of previous studies to investigate how crowdedness may influence consumers' food spending and ch...

The role of diet in aging is pivotal, yet existing research offers inconsistent findings regarding the impact of specific diets on human aging. We conducted a systematic investigation into the relationship between dietary factors and aging, exploring potential causal links between macronutrient intake and aging. Utilizing data from the UK Biobank b...

As a cost-effective way to promote healthy eating habits and prevent obesity, nutrition labeling has drawn great public interest around the world. China implemented its first mandatory nutrition labeling regulation under the National Food Safety Standard for Nutrition Labeling of Prepackaged Foods (GB28050-2011) in 2013. Focusing on the Chinese car...

Contrary to ongoing declines in per capita milk consumption in the United States and Europe, per capita milk consumption in China is experiencing dramatic increases, making China one of the most dynamic global dairy markets. Meeting the rapid growth in milk demand presents environmental challenges under current dairy farm production in China. This...

Science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM) professionals are regarded as the highly skilled labor force that fosters economic productivity, enterprise innovation, and international competitiveness of a country. We conducted a genome-wide association study on the occupational choice of STEM jobs based on a sample of 178,976 participant...

Using panel data from National Rural Fixed Point Survey and a supplementary survey about rural ICT projects, this paper empirically analyzes the impact of ICTs on rural households’ income and income disparity in China. The results show that ICTs promotes the growth of total income and wage income of rural households, and has an inhibitory effect on...

Alcohol consumption has been associated with the risk of mild cognitive impairment (MCI) in observational studies. The result is inconsistent and whether the association is causal remains unknown. To examine the causal effect of alcohol consumption on MCI in rural China, this study used a cross-sectional dataset that included 1966 observations coll...

Promoting the transition from animal meat to plant-based food consumption has significant benefits for public health and environmental sustainability. This study, involving 526 consumers from Beijing, China, explores how food attributes and information may affect consumers’ food choices concerning plant-based meat products. A discrete choice experi...

Introduction In China, the direct-to-consumer genetic testing (DTC-GT) industry has been undergoing exponential growth during the past few years. This study intends to assess characteristics of DTC-GT users in China, estimate the price elasticity of demand, quantify monetary values of DTC-GT features, and discuss its implications to the development...

Alcohol consumption has been linked to a number of adverse health outcomes, but the relationships between alcohol use and economic outcomes remain mixed. In this study, we investigate the causal impact of alcohol consumption on income by using genetic instruments of ALDH2 rs671 and ADH1B rs1229984 in the Mendelian randomization (MR) framework. Alth...

This article investigates how the COVID-19 pandemic and related public health measures affected the consumption of food away from home (FAFH) among Chinese consumers. We obtained access to the complete sales records from a major restaurant chain in China, for 111 sites located in 12 cities, covering over 5.6 million high-frequency dining transactio...

Following domestication in the lower Yangtze River valley 9400 years ago, rice farming spread throughout China and changed lifestyle patterns among Neolithic populations. Here, we report evidence that the advent of rice domestication and cultivation may have shaped humans not only culturally but also genetically. Leveraging recent findings from mol...

Individual food choices and consumption are closely relating to one’s diet, nutrition, and health. Using the case of alcoholic beverages, this study extends the random-utility framework by incorporating genetic information into consumer demand models, and demonstrates the significant impact of genetic factors on individual food choice decisions in...

Background: Alcohol use has been linked to a number of physical conditions, but the relationship between alcohol drinking and depression, one of the most common mental disorders that is a significant contributor to the global burden of disease, is still under debate. We aim to help fill the literature gap on the causal effect of alcohol use on depr...

This study uses a Mendelian randomization approach to resolve the difficulties of identifying the causal relationship between height and earnings by using a unique sample of 3,427 respondents from mainland China with sociodemographic information linked to individual genotyping data. Exploiting genetic variations to create instrumental variables for...

Voluntary nutrition labeling, a means of nutrition quality disclosure, was introduced in the U.S. over the last decade by leading food manufacturers, primarily in the form of front-of-package (FOP) labeling. This article examines how consumer responses to FOP labeling via product participation and information spillovers shift consumer demand across...

A series of safety incidents related to domestically-produced infant formulas (DIFs) almost destroyed Chinese consumers' confidence in domestic dairy products. Understanding consumer confidence and its effect on consumption behavior is important to restore consumer confidence and enhance the competitiveness of domestic diary industry. This article...

In genetics, heterosis refers to the phenomenon that cross-breeding within species leads to offspring that are genetically fitter than their parents and exhibit improved phenotypic characteristics. Based on the theory of heterosis and existing genetic evidence, offspring of “hybrid” marriages (spouses originating from different states/provinces/cou...

This article examines whether or not a reduction in consumer search cost for nutritional information increases the probability that heterogeneous consumers will choose healthier food products. Empirical results from the ready-to-eat breakfast cereal (RTEC) market confirm the conceptual analysis that lowering information cost via simplified nutritio...

The expansion of private labels, or store brands, has transformed consumer choice sets and competition in retail markets, prompting manufacturers to fight back with renewed pricing and product and promotion strategies to forestall further private label expansion. This article examines the spillover effects of television advertising on brand-level c...

We examine the impact of four policy options on consumption of carbonated soft drinks (CSDs) by estimating a random-coefficient discrete-choice model of demand. Policy simulations using demand estimates indicate that the impacts of banning television advertising, limiting container size, and limiting calories on total consumption would be similar—a...

This study examines the effects of television advertising on consumer demand for carbonated soft drinks using a random coefficients logit model (BLP) with household and advertising data from seven U.S. cities over a three year period. We find that advertising decreases the price elasticity of demand, indicating that advertising plays predominantly...

In 2007 this analysis reveals that the total impact of Connecticut’s agricultural industry on the state economy ($212 billion Gross State Product) was up to $3.5 billion, measuring the value of agricultural output as statewide sales generated directly from the industry and through spillover effects on other industries. In addition, the industry con...