Understanding social preferences with simple tests

• 成果类型: Article
• 署名作者: Charness, G; Rabin, M
• 署名单位: University of California System; University of California Santa Barbara; University of California System; University of California Berkeley
• 刊物名称: QUARTERLY JOURNAL OF ECONOMICS
• ISSN/ISSBN: 0033-5533
• DOI: 10.1162/003355302760193904
• 发表日期: 2002
• 页码: 817-869
• 关键词: fairness; RECIPROCITY; strategy; equity; ERC

摘要

Departures from self-interest in economic experiments have recently inspired models of social preferences. We design a range of simple experimental games that test these theories more directly than existing experiments. Our experiments show that subjects are more concerned with increasing social welfare-sacrificing to increase the payoffs for all recipients, especially low-payoff recipients-than with reducing differences in payoffs (as supposed in recent models). Subjects are also motivated by reciprocity: they withdraw willingness to sacrifice to achieve a fair outcome when others are themselves unwilling to sacrifice, and sometimes punish unfair behavior.