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14 - Using Experiments to Inform the Regulation of Consumer Contracts

from Part II - Introductions

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  17 May 2025

By
Meirav Furth-Matzkin
Edited by
Kevin Tobia
Kevin Tobia
Affiliation:
Georgetown University, Washington DC
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Summary

Most of the contracts we sign are standard form consumer contracts. Also known as boilerplate or fine print agreements, these uniform “one-size-fits-all” agreements are the most common type of economic contract, used for billions of commercial transactions each year. As this chapter will highlight, experimental research has the potential to significantly inform the regulatory discourse about consumer contracts by providing evidence as to the problems that consumer contracts generate, as well as to the effectiveness of the regulatory tools currently implemented (or under consideration) in addressing these problems. This chapter reviews existing experimental scholarship on consumer contracting with the goal of elucidating its contributions to our knowledge, while at the same time highlighting what remains to be done. Its focus is on experimental studies involving three main issues: (1) consumers’ contracting realities – how consumers behave around form contracts; (2) consumer psychology – how consumers perceive form contracts and the law governing them; and (3) how different regulatory interventions could refashion these contracting realities.

Keywords

contractconsumer contracts
Type
Chapter
Information
The Cambridge Handbook of Experimental Jurisprudence , pp. 217 - 238
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
Print publication year: 2025

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