AEASP 2024 Fellow Darien Kearney

Darien Kearney is a Ph.D. student in economics at Howard University focusing on Behavioral Economics. Darien started his academic journey at Sam Houston State University, earning a Bachelor of Business Administration in Finance and Banking Services (double major) and a Master of Business Administration in Finance. While at Sam Houston State University, he was part of the student leadership boards for the National Association of Black Accountants (NABA) and the Beta Alpha Psi National Honor Society (Kappa Mu Chapter), where he helped develop fundraising opportunities to increase chapter revenue. Darien then pursued a Master of Science degree in applied psychology from the University of Southern California, where he wrote his thesis on the trading behavior of retail traders in relation to the meme stock frenzy. In his thesis, he analyzed how social media, market sentiment, and cognitive biases influenced individual investors' investment decisions under Dr. Jorge Barraza's guidance. Darien also has a Master of Science degree in applied economics from Cornell University, where he wrote his thesis on the relationship between emotional well-being and student loan debt. In his thesis, he examined how different levels of student debt affect the happiness, confidence, and worry of young adults under the guidance of Dr. Vicki Bogan. Darien, a proud native of Houston, Texas, is driven by a deep passion for advancing the field of economics and contributing to the public good. This passion was evident in his participation as a cohort member of the American Economic Association Summer Program (AEASP), where he conducted research on the financial impacts of well-being on young adults under the guidance of Dr. Neil R. Ericsson and Dr. Justin R. Pierce of the Board of Governors of the Federal Reserve System. He also had the privilege of being a mentee of the Research in Color (RIC) 2021 cohort, where he delved into the relationship between performance and player utilization in the NBA under the guidance of Dr. Sarah Jacobson.