Open Access. Powered by Scholars. Published by Universities.®
Social and Behavioral Sciences Commons™
Open Access. Powered by Scholars. Published by Universities.®
- Discipline
Articles 1 - 9 of 9
Full-Text Articles in Social and Behavioral Sciences
Testing The Boundaries Of The Double Auction: The Effects Of Complete Information And Market Power, Erik O. Kimbrough
Testing The Boundaries Of The Double Auction: The Effects Of Complete Information And Market Power, Erik O. Kimbrough
Economics Faculty Articles and Research
We report boundary experiments testing the robustness of price convergence in double auction markets for non-durable goods in which there is extreme earnings inequality at the competitive equilibrium (CE). Following up on a conjecture by Smith (1976a), we test whether the well-known equilibrating power of the double auction institution is robust to the presence of complete information about traders’ values and costs and the presence of symmetric market power. We find that complete information is insufficient to impede convergence to CE prices; however, introducing market power consistently causes prices to deviate from the CE, whether or not subjects possess complete …
Monitoring Institutions In Indefinitely Repeated Games, Gabriele Camera, Marco Casari
Monitoring Institutions In Indefinitely Repeated Games, Gabriele Camera, Marco Casari
ESI Working Papers
Does monitoring past conduct facilitate intertemporal cooperation? We designed an experiment characterized by strategic uncertainty and multiple equilibria where coordinating on the efficient outcome is a challenge. Participants, interacting anonymously in a group, could pay a cost either to obtain information about their counterparts, or to create a freely available public record of individual conduct. Both monitoring institutions were actively employed. However, groups were unable to attain higher levels of cooperation compared to a treatment without monitoring. Information about past conduct alone thus appears to be ineffective in overcoming coordination challenges.
Media Use And International Engagement, Brenna Parish
Media Use And International Engagement, Brenna Parish
Student Scholar Symposium Abstracts and Posters
The internet’s interactive composition and fluid interface has changed the way in which individuals acquire information, and has given consumers of news media a means to access a large amount of information regarding political content and international issues. Furthermore, the internet provides users the choice of the information that they consume, which contrasts the rigid, predetermined nature of televised news media. Because of this, this research project will compare the effects of both television and internet media on engagement in international affairs in order to examine the difference between old and new forms of media. Through a statistical analysis of …
When Income Depends On Performance And Luck: The Effects Of Culture And Information On Giving, Pedro Rey-Biel, Roman M. Sheremeta, Neslihan Uler
When Income Depends On Performance And Luck: The Effects Of Culture And Information On Giving, Pedro Rey-Biel, Roman M. Sheremeta, Neslihan Uler
ESI Working Papers
We study how giving depends on income and luck, and how culture and information about the determinants of others’ income affect this relationship. Our data come from an experiment conducted in two countries, the US and Spain, which have different beliefs about how income inequality arises. We find no cross-cultural differences in giving when individuals are informed about the determinants of income, but when uninformed, Americans give less than Spanish. Culture and information not only affect individual giving, but also the determinants of giving and the beliefs about how income inequality arises. Beliefs partially moderate cross-cultural differences in giving.
Selective Recognition: How To Recognize Donors To Increase Charitable Giving, Anya Samek, Roman Sheremeta
Selective Recognition: How To Recognize Donors To Increase Charitable Giving, Anya Samek, Roman Sheremeta
ESI Working Papers
Recognizing donors by revealing their identities is important for increasing charitable giving. We conducted a field experiment to examine how different recognition methods impact giving, and found that all forms of recognition that we examined had a positive impact on increasing donations, whereby recognizing only highest donors (positive recognition) and recognizing only lowest donors (negative recognition) had the most pronounced effect. We argue that selective recognition (both positive and negative) creates tournament-like incentives. Recognizing the highest donors activates the desire to seek a positive prize of prestige, thus increasing the proportion of donors who contribute large amounts. Recognizing the lowest …
The Coordination Value Of Monetary Exchange: Experimental Evidence, Gabriele Camera, Marco Casari
The Coordination Value Of Monetary Exchange: Experimental Evidence, Gabriele Camera, Marco Casari
Economics Faculty Articles and Research
What institutions can sustain cooperation in groups of strangers? Here we study the role of monetary systems. In an experiment, subjects sometimes needed help and sometimes could incur a cost to help an anonymous counterpart. In the absence of money, the intertemporal exchange of help, which could be supported by a norm of community punishment of defectors, did not emerge. Introducing intrinsically worthless tokens substantially altered patterns of behavior. Monetary trade emerged, which increased predictability of play and promoted cooperation when strangers could trade help for a token.
Age Effects And Heuristics In Decision Making, Tibor Besedeš, Cary Deck, Sudipta Sarangi, Mikhael Shor
Age Effects And Heuristics In Decision Making, Tibor Besedeš, Cary Deck, Sudipta Sarangi, Mikhael Shor
Economics Faculty Articles and Research
Using controlled experiments, we examine how individuals make choices when faced with multiple options. Choice tasks are designed to mimic the selection of health insurance, prescription drug, or retirement savings plans. In our experiment, available options can be objectively ranked, allowing us to examine optimal decision making. First, the probability of a person selecting the optimal option declines as the number of options increases, with the decline being more pronounced for older subjects. Second, heuristics differ by age, with older subjects relying more on suboptimal decision rules. In a heuristics validation experiment, older subjects make worse decisions than younger subjects.
Visibility Of Contributions And Cost Of Information: An Experiment On Public Goods, Anya Savikhin, Roman M. Sheremeta
Visibility Of Contributions And Cost Of Information: An Experiment On Public Goods, Anya Savikhin, Roman M. Sheremeta
ESI Working Papers
We experimentally investigate the impact of visibility of information about contributors on contributions in the public goods game. We systematically consider several treatments that are similar to a wide range of situations in practice. First, we vary the cost of viewing identifiable information about contributors. Second, we vary recognizing all, top or bottom contributors. We find that recognizing all contributors significantly increases contributions relative to the baseline. Recognizing only the top contributors is not significantly different from not recognizing contributors, but recognizing only the bottom contributors is as effective as recognizing all contributors. When viewing information about contributors is costly, …
Adaptive Rationality: An Evolutionary Perspective On Cognitive Bias, Martie Haselton, Gregory A. Bryant, Andreas Wilke, David Frederick, Andrew Galperin, Willem E. Frankenhuis, Tyler Moore
Adaptive Rationality: An Evolutionary Perspective On Cognitive Bias, Martie Haselton, Gregory A. Bryant, Andreas Wilke, David Frederick, Andrew Galperin, Willem E. Frankenhuis, Tyler Moore
Psychology Faculty Articles and Research
A casual look at the literature in social cognition reveals a vast collection of biases, errors, violations of rational choice, and failures to maximize utility. One is tempted to draw the conclusion that the human mind is woefully muddled. We present a three-category evolutionary taxonomy of evidence of biases: biases are (a) heuristics, (b) error management effects, or (c) experimental artifacts. We conclude that much of the research on cognitive biases can be profitably reframed and understood in evolutionary terms. An adaptationist perspective suggests that the mind is remarkably well designed for important problems of survival and reproduction, and not …