We perform a meta analysis of gender differences in the standard windfall gains dictator game (DG) by collecting raw data from 53 studies with 117 conditions, giving us 15,016 unique individual observations. We find that women on average give 4 percentage points more than men (Cohen’s $d=0.16$), and that this difference decreases to $3.1\%$ points (Cohen’s $d=0.13$) if we exclude studies where dictators can only give all or nothing. The gender difference is larger if the recipient in the DG is a charity, compared to the standard DG with an anonymous individual as the recipient (a 10.9 versus a $2.3\%$ points gender difference). These effect sizes imply that many individual studies on gender differences are underpowered; the median power in our sample of standard DG studies is only $9\%$ to detect the meta-analytic gender difference at the $5\%$ significance level. Moving forward on this topic, sample sizes should thus be substantially larger than what has been the norm in the past.

This article studies whether people want to control what information on their own past pro-social behavior is revealed to others. Participants are assigned a color that depends on their past pro-social behavior. They can spend money to manipulate the probability with which their color is revealed to another participant. The data show that participants are more likely to reveal colors with more favorable informational content. This pattern is not found in a control treatment in which colors are randomly assigned, thus revealing nothing about past pro-social behavior. Regression analysis confirms these findings, also when controlling for past pro-social behavior. These results complement the existing empirical evidence, confirming that people strategically and, therefore, consciously manipulate their social image.

In this study we investigate the effect of framing on bribery behaviour. To do this, we replicate Barr and Serra (Exp Econ, 12(4):488–503, (2009) and carry out a simple one-shot bribery game that mimics corruption. In one treatment, we presented the experiment in a framed version, in which wording was embedded with social context; in the other, we removed the social context and presented the game in a neutral manner. The contribution of this paper is that it offers a comparison of framing effects in two highly corrupt countries: China and Uganda. Our results provide evidence of strong and significant framing effects for Uganda, but not for China.

In this project, we manipulate the public observability of forecasts and outcomes of a physical task. We explore how these manipulations affect overconfidence (OC). Participants in the experiment are asked to hold a weight after predicting how long they think they could do it for. Comparing the prediction and outcome times (in seconds) yields a measure of OC. We independently vary two dimensions of public observability (of the outcome and of the prediction). Additionally, we manipulate incentives to come up with an accurate prediction. This design allows us to shed light on the mechanism behind male and female OC. Following the existing literature, we formulate several hypotheses regarding the differences in predictions and outcomes for males and females in the presence of the public observability of predictions and outcomes. Our experimental data do not provide support to most of the hypotheses: in particular, there is no evidence of a gender gap in overconfidence. The most robust finding that emerges from our results is that incentives on making correct predictions increase participants’ forecasts on their own performance (by about 24%) and their actual performance as well, but to a lower extent (by about 8%); in addition, incentives to predict correctly in fact increase error for females (by about 33%).

Many studies report on the association between 2D:4D, a putative marker for prenatal testosterone exposure, and economic preferences. However, most of these studies have limited sample sizes and test multiple hypotheses (without preregistration). In this study we mainly replicate the common specifications found in the literature for the association between the 2D:4D ratio and risk taking, the willingness to compete, and dictator game giving separately. In a sample of 330 women we find no robust associations between any of these economic preferences and 2D:4D. We find no evidence of a statistically significant relation for 16 of the 18 total regressions we run. The two regression specifications which are statistically significant have not previously been reported and the associations are not in the expected direction, and therefore they are unlikely to represent a real effect.

We introduce stochastic loss into a gift exchange game to study how information on intentions affects reciprocity. In one treatment, the respondent observes the amount received and whether a loss occurred, so both the consequential outcome and the sender’s original intention are known. In the other two treatments, information about whether a loss occurred is hidden, and the respondent is only informed of the amount received (outcome) or the amount initially sent (intention). Using both regression-based approaches and non-parametric tests, we find greater reciprocity in the two treatments that reveal intentions. These differences arise even in a simple one-shot setting without reputational benefits and are economically meaningful; they are similar in magnitude to the difference attributable to a full point reduction in the amount received. Our findings show the impact of the information environment on reciprocity in settings with uncertainty and suggest that transparency is important to reciprocity.

We experimentally study intention-based social influence in standard and modified Ultimatum and Impunity games. Standard games with bi-dimensional strategy vectors let individuals decide independently in the role of proposer and responder and allow fairness intentions to be role dependent. Uni-dimensional strategy vectors in modified games constrain individuals to consistent offers and acceptance thresholds. To induce social influence, we randomly match participants in groups of four, which are minimally identified by colors. Social influence is assessed by how one reacts to information about median group intention(s). The $2\times 2$ factorial experimental design varies the order of the two game types and the strategy vector dimensionality. Social influence, depending on the game type and strategy dimensionality, significantly impacts participants’ behavior compared to their own intention. At the aggregate level, however, these differences cancel each other out. As there are more constraints on the action space, uni-dimensionality increases strategic concerns.

The hypothesis that intuition promotes cooperation has attracted considerable attention. Although key results in this literature have failed to replicate in pre-registered studies, recent meta-analyses report an overall effect of intuition on cooperation. We address the question with a meta-analysis of 82 cooperation experiments, spanning four different types of intuition manipulations—time pressure, cognitive load, depletion, and induction—including 29,315 participants in total. We obtain a positive overall effect of intuition on cooperation, though substantially weaker than that reported in prior meta-analyses, and between studies the effect exhibits a high degree of systematic variation. We find that this overall effect depends exclusively on the inclusion of six experiments featuring emotion-induction manipulations, which prompt participants to rely on emotion over reason when making allocation decisions. Upon excluding from the total data set experiments featuring this class of manipulations, between-study variation in the meta-analysis is reduced substantially—and we observed no statistically discernable effect of intuition on cooperation. Overall, we fail to obtain compelling evidence for the intuitive cooperation hypothesis.

We consider a dictator game experiment in which dictators perform a sequence of giving tasks and taking tasks. The data are used to estimate the parameters of a Stone–Geary utility function over own-payoff and other’s payoff. The econometric model incorporates zero observations (e.g. zero-giving or zero-taking) by applying the Kuhn–Tucker theorem and treating zeros as corner solutions in the dictator’s constrained optimisation problem. The method of maximum simulated likelihood (MSL) is used for estimation. We find that selfishness is significantly lower in taking tasks than in giving tasks, and we attribute this difference to the “cold prickle of taking”.

In a seminal paper, Frederick et al. (J Consum Res 36:553–561, 2009) showed that people’s willingness to purchase a consumer good declined dramatically when opportunity costs were made more salient (Cohen’s d = 0.45–0.85). This finding suggests that people normally do not pay sufficient attention to opportunity costs and as a result make poorer and less efficient decisions, both in private and public domains. To critically assess the strength of opportunity cost neglect, we carried out a systematic review and a meta-analysis including published and non-published experimental work. In total, 39 experimental studies were included in the meta-analysis (N = 14,005). The analysis shows a robust significant effect (Cohen’s d = 0.22; p < 0.001) of opportunity cost neglect across different domains, albeit the effect is considerably smaller than what was originally estimated by Frederick et al. (2009). Our findings highlight the importance of meta-analyses and replications of initial findings.

I find necessary and sufficient conditions for first-order stochastic dominance (FOSD) violations for choices from a budget line of Arrow securities. Applying this characterization to existing data, I compare FOSD violation rates across a broad set of risk preference elicitation tasks.

In an experiment, we first elicit the distributional preferences of subjects and then let them bid for a lottery, either in a Becker–DeGroot–Marschak (BDM) mechanism or a Vickrey auction (VA). The standard theory predicts that altruistic subjects underbid in the VA—compared to the BDM—while spiteful subjects overbid in the VA. The data do not confirm those predictions. While we observe aggregate underbidding in the VA, the result is not driven by the choices of altruistic subjects.

This article replicates an experiment by Coffman et al. (Manag Sci 67(6):3551–3569, 2021) who separated taste-based and statistical discrimination by comparing employer choices in one of two hiring environments (treatments). Both treatments were characterized by the same ability distributions of workers in tasks on which men are found to outperform women on average, but only one allowed for gender-specific considerations. We found statistical discrimination against women when they are presented to employers not as women, but as people belonging to a low-performance group, but discrimination in their favor when their gender is revealed to potential employers. This discrimination in favor of women was observed in both male and female employers. It was greater when employers were women and disappeared when monetary incentives to employ more productive workers were higher for employers.

We test whether anchoring affects people’s elicited valuations for a bottle of wine in individual decision-making and in markets. We anchor subjects by asking them if they are willing to sell a bottle of wine for a transparently uninformative random price. We elicit subjects’ Willingness-To-Accept for the bottle before and after the market. Subjects participate in a double auction market either in a small or a large trading group. The variance in subjects’ Willingness-To-Accept shrinks within trading groups. Our evidence supports the idea that markets have the potential to diminish anchoring effects. However, the market is not needed: our anchoring manipulation failed in a large sample. In a concise meta-analysis, we identify the circumstances under which anchoring effects of preferences can be expected.

According to the theory of guilt aversion, agents suffer a psychological cost whenever they fall short of other people’s expectations. In this paper, we suggest that there may be limits to this kind of motivation. We present evidence from an experimental dictator game showing that behavior is consistent with guilt aversion for relatively low levels of recipient expectations, roughly up to the point where the recipient expects half of the available surplus. Beyond that point the relationship between expectations and transfers becomes negative. Moreover, we examine this relationship at the individual level and establish a typology of subjects depending on how and whether they condition their behavior on recipient expectations.

Internet services are often free of charge but ask for customers’ personal data in exchange for usage. We experimentally study whether the provision of information-based public goods is susceptible to restraint when contributions not only make contributors better off but also enable a non-contributing “big player” to acquire substantial profits. We show that the presence of the big player crowds out the willingness to provide neutral tokens, but no such effect is observed for the provision of private information. Hence, collecting anonymized personal data instead of monetary fees can be more profitable to service providers and create greater benefits for customers.

We study the effects on performance of incentives framed as gains or losses, as well as the effort channels through which individuals increase performance. We also explore potential spill-over effects on a non-incentivised activity. Subjects participated in a medically framed real-effort task under one of the three contracts, varying the type of performance incentive received: (1) no incentive; (2) incentive framed as a gain; or (3) incentive framed as a loss. We find that performance improved similarly with incentives framed as losses or gains. However, individuals increase performance differently under the two frames: potential losses increase participants’ performance through a greater attention (fewer mistakes), while bonuses increase the time spent on the rewarded activity. There is no spill-over effect, either negative or positive, on the non-incentivised activity. We discuss the meaning and implications of our results for the design of performance contracts.

People behave much more cooperatively than predicted by the self-interest hypothesis in social dilemmas such as public goods games. Some studies have suggested that many decision makers cooperate not because of genuine cooperative preferences but because they are confused about the incentive structure of the game—and therefore might not be aware of the dominant strategy. In this research, we experimentally manipulate whether decision makers receive explicit information about which strategies maximize individual income and group income or not. Our data reveal no statistically significant effects of the treatment variation, neither on elicited contribution preferences nor on unconditional contributions and beliefs in a repeated linear public goods game. We conclude that it is unlikely that confusion about optimal strategies explains the widely observed cooperation patterns in social dilemmas such as public goods games.

Building on a partner-switching mechanism, we experimentally test two theories that posit different reasons why promises breed trust and cooperation. The expectation-based explanation (EBE) operates via belief-dependent guilt aversion, while the commitment-based explanation (CBE) suggests that promises offer commitment power via a (belief-independent) preference to keep one’s word. Previous research performed a similar test, which we argue should be interpreted as concerning informal agreements rather than (unilateral) promises.

We run an eye-tracking experiment to investigate whether players change their gaze patterns and choices after they experience alternative models of choice in one-shot games. In phase 1 and 3, participants play 2 × 2 matrix games with a human counterpart; in phase 2, they apply specific decision rules while playing with a computer with known behavior. We classify participants in types based on their gaze patterns in phase 1 and explore attentional shifts in phase 3, after players were exposed to the alternative decision rules. Results show that less sophisticated players, who focus mainly on their own payoffs, change their gaze patterns towards the evaluation of others’ incentives in phase 3. This attentional shift predicts an increase in equilibrium responses in relevant classes of games. Conversely, cooperative players do not change their visual analysis. Our results shed new light on theories of bounded rationality and on theories of social preferences.