Chris Cotton

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I’m an economist who studies information, expertise, and policymaking. My work incorporates informational and organizational economics, political economy, and applied microeconomics; while I began as a game theorist, my research and graduate teaching today span theory, econometrics, and experiments. It includes work on how individuals and organizations learn, on the research and evaluation process, and on decision-making under uncertainty and pressure. It has applications in evidence-based policy, education, health, technology, productivity, and the economics of science. My research is also informed by sustained engagement with real-world institutions, including leading national research-policy networks during COVID-19 and advising many of the world’s leading development and health organizations on evidence and evaluation.

My work has published in the Journal of Political Economy, American Economic Review, and other leading journals in and beyond economics (publications, CV). I have supervised the research of more than 50 PhD and MA students and teach across economics, policy, and business programs at Queen’s. Graduate students interested in working with me should attend my regular study group.

Select Recent Publications: (for all articles, see my publications page or CV)

Cotton & Hickman (2026), Affirmative action, shifting competition, and human capital accumulation: A comparative static analysis of investment contests, Journal of Human Capital, Accepted

Cotton & Scholle Cotton (2026), The AI Expertise Paradox, Issues in Science and Technology (National Academy of Sciences)

Cotton, Hickman, List, Price, & Roy (2026), Why Don’t Struggling Kids Do Their Homework? Disentangling Motivation and Study Productivity in a Model of Human Capital Investment, Journal of Political Economy

Nordstrom, Robb, & Cotton (2026), Using Full Matching to Measure the Marginal Benefit of Bicycles in a Multifaceted Development Program, Journal of Development Effectiveness

Cotton, Alam, Tosta, Buchman, & Maslove (2025), Effect of monetary incentives on peer review acceptance and completion: A quasi-randomized interventional trial, Critical Care Medicine

Nordstrom & Cotton (2025), The Impact of a Severe Drought on Girls’ Attendance and Learning, American Educational Research Journal

Cotton, Nordstrom, Nanowski, & Richter (2025), Can Discussions About Girls’ Education Improve Academic Outcomes: Evidence from a Randomized Development Intervention, World Bank Economic Review

Cotton, LaBarge, & Nordstrom (2025), Canadian Public Health Experiences with COVID-19 and a New Framework for Assessing Evidence, Frontiers in Public Health

Corazzini, Cotton, Longo, & Reggiani (2024), Coordinated selection of collective action: Wealthy-interest bias and inequality, Journal of Public Economics

Other News & Updates:
5/26/26: I was interviewed by The Hill Times for an article on the need for a government COVID inquiry. The article also discusses Lasting Disruption and ongoing research on common failures of evidence-based decision-making during crises.
4/30/26: My recent work showed that student disengagement is often due to a lack of learning opportunity rather than a lack of inherent motivation. My new discussion paper considers its implications for policy.
4/22/26: Interviewed by Canadian Affairs about federal lobbying reform.
4/16/26: The “AI-Expertise Paradox” was featured in a Smith Business Insights article.
4/13/26: Interviewed for The Hill Times on campaign finance disclosure rules.
4/10/26: The Hub published an excerpt from our recent article on the impact of pandemic school closures.
1/5/26: Kicking off a course on evidence-based policy and program evaluation at the Queen’s School of Policy Studies.
12/28/25: New working paper on how the timing of star-performer engagement on teams affects approaches to collaboration and eventual team success.
12/2/25: Another round of commentary about my experiment providing incentives to journal referees has been published at Critical Care Medicine.
12/1/25: two-part summary of my speech at the 38th Annual Smith School of Business Economic Forecast Lunch posted on EconomicsandPolicy.ca. Part 1 (the Canadian economy is broken) and Part 2 (five scenarios for an uncertain economy).
11/28/25: Media coverage in the Whig Standard.
11/27/25: speaker at the KEDCo and Smith School of Business 38th Annual Forecast Lunch.
11/10/25: Lasting Disruption, my forthcoming book (I am the editor and a contributing author) from McGill-Queen’s University Press is finally going to the printer.
11/7/25: Canadian Public Economics Group annual meetings (I co-lead CPEG).
10/22/25: new publication questioning the interprovincial trade reform promises in IRPP volume.
10/21/25: appointed specialty editor at the upstart Behavioral Public Policy, Frontiers in Behavioral Economics open science journal.
10/20/25: kicking off four weeks of executive teaching in the CPIA program at Smith School of Business.
9/3/25: 10th International Conference on Peer Review and Scientific Publishing.
6/9/25: editorial in The Hill Times on interprovincial trade reform.
6/6/25: co-authored an article summarizing my recent work on community engagement in support of girls’ education at VoxDev.
5/25: Canadian Economics Association annual meetings (I organized the public economics sessions).
5/25: our March article in Critical Care Medicine kicked off forum discussion and several commentary pieces.
4/25/25: moderator for Queen’s School of Policy Studies public symposium on Integrating Health and Social Policy.
3/25: my work with PhD candidate Daniel Teeter is guiding interprovincial trade reform.
3/25: media coverage for the CCM article in Nature, Nature again, and the Queen’s Gazette.
3/25: expert report on the impact of government policy on inflation during COVID-19 (litigation support).