u/Maleficent-Field4234

Hey r/Academia! As an high school student, I became fascinated by how digital payments are transforming our cognitive relationship with money—not just at the personal level, but in terms of broader economic outcomes. Being shortlisted for the John Locke Essay Competition (Economics category) inspired me to go beyond the limits of the essay format and develop my ideas into a comprehensive research paper.

I spent weeks delving into how the transition to a cashless society might alter both micro-level decision-making and macroeconomic indicators. My research draws on information theory—using measures like Shannon entropy and KL divergence—to quantify the 'cognitive friction' lost in digital payments, which I hypothesize could impact self-regulation, budgeting, and even aggregate economic behavior. After significant research and technical learning, I uploaded my finished work to SSRN.

Yesterday, SSRN published my paper: "The Cognitive Friction of Money: Information-Theoretic Evaluation of a Fully Cashless Society." I would be grateful for any academic perspectives on my methodology, theoretical framing, or the broader relevance of my findings. Constructive feedback on the approach or suggestions for further research directions would be especially appreciated!

My research paper can be found on the page below:

https://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=7234000

Hey r/AskEconomics! I’m a 16-year-old soon-to-be senior in high school, and this summer, I found myself obsessed with a question: What really happens to our behavior and the economy when cash becomes a thing of the past? After being shortlisted for the John Locke Essay Competition (Economics category), I realized I had way more to say than would fit in a standard essay—so I set out to dig deeper and turn my ideas into a full research paper.

I spent weeks exploring how going fully cashless could change everything from transaction costs to how we make decisions about spending and saving. I wanted to understand not just the technological shift, but the very real economic trade-offs and hidden costs that come with it. After a lot of late nights, research, and learning how to make my paper look legit, I uploaded my finished work to SSRN—a great spot for young, independent researchers.

Yesterday, SSRN published my paper: "The Cognitive Friction of Money: Information-Theoretic Evaluation of a Fully Cashless Society." I’d love to hear what this community thinks about the economic implications I explore—like how information costs, friction, and new incentives might reshape our everyday choices in a cashless world. Any feedback on my arguments, reasoning, or the overall topic would be incredibly valuable!My research paper can be found on the page below:

https://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=7234000

Hey r/BehavioralEconomics! I’m a 16-year-old about to start my senior year of high school, and this summer, I dove headfirst into the intersection of behavioral and monetary economics. After being shortlisted for the John Locke Essay Competition (Economics category), I realized that my original essay barely scratched the surface of how psychology and cognition shape our interactions with money—especially as societies go cashless.

With so much more to say, I expanded my work into a full research paper focused on the behavioral side of monetary systems.That meant weeks of reading behavioral economics research, learning how scholars evaluate cognitive friction, and teaching myself LaTeX to present my arguments rigorously. Eventually, I uploaded my finished work to SSRN—a platform open to independent researchers like me, even without institutional affiliation.

Yesterday, SSRN officially published my paper: "The Cognitive Friction of Money: Information-Theoretic Evaluation of a Fully Cashless Society." In it, I explore how behavioral biases, decision fatigue, and attention costs could shape economic behavior as societies move away from physical cash. Since I wrote this independently, I’m eager for feedback from this community—especially on the behavioral frameworks, cognitive mechanisms, and any other insights from a behavioral economics perspective!My research paper can be found on the page below:

https://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=7234000