We compare the rationality of choice under risk – utility maximization, stochastic dominance, and expected-utility maximization – of students from one of the best universities in the US and one of the best universities in Africa. The US subjects came nearer to consistency with utility maximization and the dominance principle, but there are no differences between the two samples in consistency w...

We investigate to what extent genuine social preferences can explain observed other-regarding behavior. In a dictator game variant subjects can choose whether to learn about the consequences of their choice for the receiver. We find that a majority of subjects showing other-regarding behavior when the payoffs of the receiver are known, choose to ignore these consequences if possible. This behav...

This paper considers the observational implications of social influences on adoption decisions for an environment of perfect foresight adopters. We argue that social influences can produce two observable effects: (1) discontinuities in unconditional adoption curves and (2) pattern reversals in conditional adoption curves, in which earlier adoption is found for one group of actors versus another...

Pricing schemes that vary prices in response to demand shocks may antagonize consumers and reduce demand. At the same time, consumers may take advantage of the opportunities offered by price changes. Overall, the net impact of varying price on demand is ambiguous. We investigate the issue empirically, exploiting a unique dataset from a firm that has experimented with different pricing schemes. ...

In-group favoritism in social dilemma situations is one of the main findings of studies in Social Identity Theory. We investigate what causes the in-group bias: is it due to mere group affiliation or, alternatively, is guilt-aversion a possible explanation? We induce group membership in a minimal group setting, observe in-/out-group transfers and elicit respective beliefs. We find that mere gro...

This paper argues that politicians are overprotected. The costs of political assassination differ systematically depending on whether a private or a public point of view is taken. A politician attributes a very high (if not infinite) cost to his or her survival. The social cost of political assassination is much smaller as politicians are replaceable. Conversely, the private cost of the securit...

Organizations, Diffused Pivotality and Immoral Outcomes This paper studies how organizational design affects moral outcomes. Subjects face the decision to either kill mice for money or to save mice. We compare a Baseline treatment where subjects are fully pivotal to a Diffused-Pivotality treatment where subjects simultaneously choose in groups of eight. In the latter condition eight mice are ki...

We propose a novel experimental method that disentangles strategicallyand non-strategicallymotivated behavior. We apply it to an indefinitely-repeated prisoner’s dilemma game to observe simultaneously how the same individual behaves in situations with future interaction and in situations with no future interaction, while controlling for expectations. This method allows us to determine the exten...

This paper provides a brief introduction to the use and usefulness of Suzumura consistency, a coherence requirement for binary relations that weakens transitivity. The property is introduced by Suzumura (1976b) in the context of collective choice but, as demonstrated in some recent contributions, its applicability reaches beyond the boundaries of social-choice theory. In addition to a summary o...

We conduct a laboratory experiment with agents working on and principals benefiting from a real effort task in which the agents’ performance can only be evaluated subjectively. Principals give subjective performance feedback to agents and agents have an opportunity to sanction principals. In contrast to existing models of reciprocity we find that agents tend to sanction whenever the feedback of...