Inequality, role reversal and cooperation in multiple group membership settings

• Original Paper
• Open Access
• Published: 10 March 2021

• Andreas Lange,
• Jan Schmitz &
• Claudia Schwirplies

Experimental Economics volume 25, pages68–110 (2022)Cite this article

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Abstract

We investigate the role of endowment inequality in a local and global public goods setting with multiple group membership and examine the effect of temporal role reversal on cooperation decisions. Subjects can contribute to a global public good which benefits all subjects and two local public goods which benefit only subjects of either their own group or the group of the other endowment type. Endowment inequality per-se decreases contributions of subjects with a high endowment to the global public good, but increases cooperation of subjects with a low endowment on their local public good, thereby aggravating income disparities. Exogenously induced role reversal for several periods affects cooperation behavior of subjects with a high endowment positively and induces them to contribute more to the global good. Cooperation in unequal environments thus appears to be more stable when all parties have experienced the public goods game from the disadvantageous perspective.

Incentives and prosocial behavior

Bénabou, Roland, and Jean Tirole. “Incentives and prosocial behavior." American economic review 96.5 (2006): 1652-1678. [PDF] princeton.edu

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What is, therefore, the broader set of motives that shape people’s social conduct, and how do these motives interact with each other and the economic environment?

Theory and experiment: What are the questions?

Smith, Vernon L. “Theory and experiment: What are the questions?." Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization 73.1 (2010): 3-15. [PDF];[my notes]

==YNY==

Smith 提到了 OPM (other person’s money) 問題，可以用以下的方式解決

We could give the constant positive sum ultimatum game economic content as follows: Each player provides $M of his own money. Some procedure is used for pairing the subjects, and determining who is to be Player 1 and who Player 2; this procedure in some variations might incorporate an earned and/or investment feature. It is understood that their pairing has economic significance in the sense that there are synergistic gains from the interaction equal to some fixed sum y > 2M. The experimenter provides only the surplus above 2M which represents the gains from specialization and exchange, as this is the one reliable source of a “free lunch” that converts economic systems into non-zero sum games. Hence, the total to be shared under the property right rules of the game is 2M + y, making it feasible for each to receive a share of the jointly created net gain above their pooled initial contribution, 2M.

Effects of facial trustworthiness and gender on decision making in the Ultimatum Game

Wu, Yujia; Gao, Li; Wan, Yan; Wang, Fang; Xu, Sihua; Yang, Zijing; Rao, Hengyi; Pan, Yu (2018). Effects of facial trustworthiness and gender on decision making in the Ultimatum Game. Social Behavior and Personality: an international journal, 46(3), 499-516. (DOI: https://doi.org/10.2224/sbp.6966)

==abstract==

As little is yet known about the influence of facial trustworthiness and gender on fairness consideration in decision making, we examined whether a proposer’s facial trustworthiness and gender would influence a responder’s willingness to accept the proposer’s monetary offer. Participants in our study were 79 Chinese undergraduate students (responders) who played the Ultimatum Game with 4 proposers (2 male and 2 female) with different facial trustworthiness. As predicted, responders were more willing to accept offers from trustworthy-looking proposers. We found that facial trustworthiness was a more salient cue when proposers were men than when they were women and, furthermore, that the students’ emotional response to faces was correlated with their fairness consideration. Considering the implicit influence of facial trustworthiness and gender on decision making, potentially there are broader implications of our findings for certain business activities, such as negotiation and bargaining.

Does Experience Affect Fairness and Reciprocity in Lab Experiments?

Does Experience Affect Fairness and Reciprocity in Lab Experiments?

Date:	2016-07
By:	Tiziana Medda (University of Cagliari) Vittorio Pelligra (University of Cagliari) Tommaso Reggiani (LUMSA University)
URL:	http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:lsa:wpaper:wpc09&r=net
	One of the most common criticisms about the external validity of lab experiments in economics concerns the representativeness of participants usually considered in these studies. The ever-increasing number of experiments and the prevalent location of research centers in university campuses produced a peculiar category of subjects: Students with high level of laboratory experience built through repeated participations in experimental sessions. We investigate whether the experience accumulated in this way biases subjects’ behaviour in a set of simple games widely used to study social preferences (Dictator Game, Ultimatum Game, Trust Game, and Prisoner’s Dilemma Game). Our main finding shows that subjects with a high level of experience in lab experiments do not behave in a significantly different way from novices.
Keywords:	Experimental Methodology, External Validity, Experience, Lab Experiment
JEL:	D03 D83 C91 C92

Communication and voting in heterogeneous committees: An experimental study

Communication and voting in heterogeneous committees: An experimental study

Date:	2016-03
By:	Mark T. Le Quement (University of Bonn) Isabel Marcin (Max Planck Institute for Research on Collective Goods)
URL:	http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:mpg:wpaper:2016_05&r=net
	We study experimentally the effectiveness of communication in common value committees exhibiting publicly known heterogeneous biases. We test models assuming respectively self-interested and strategic-, joint payoff-maximizing- and cognitively heterogeneous agents. These predict varying degrees of strategic communication. We use a 2 x 2 design varying the information protocol (communication vs exogenous public signals) and the group composition (heterogeneous vs homogeneous). Results are only consistent with the third model. Roughly 80% of (heuristic) subjects truth-tell and vote with the majority of announced signals. Remaining (sophisticated) agents lie strategically and approximately apply their optimal decision rule.
Keywords:	Committees, Voting, Information Aggregation, Cheap Talk, Experiment
JEL:	C92 D72 D82 D83

Tell Me How to Rule: Leadership, Delegation, and Voice in Cooperation

Tell Me How to Rule: Leadership, Delegation, and Voice in Cooperation

Date:	2016
By:	Marco Faillo Federico Fornasari Luigi Mittone
URL:	http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:trn:utwpce:1604&r=net
	Following some recent studies, we experimentally test the effect of intra-group leadership in a public good experiment. Specifically, individuals taking part in our experiment are randomly assigned either the role of leader or the role of follower. Leaders take part in a public good game, aware of the fact that every decision they make directly affects their followers. In this sense, our experimental setting combines the dimension of leadership in cooperation with the one of delegated agents. In our experiment, we find that leadership produces two main effects: subjects contribute more, and tend to punish more frequently. In spite of the presence of higher contributions, we observe lower payoffs; these are caused by an aggressive behavior that push leaders to mane an undue use of punishment. Allowing one-sided communication between followers and leaders provide a different effect: communication reduces decision makers’ aggressiveness, leading to lower contributions and punishment, but better results in terms of final payoffs. The same welfare can be reached when leadership is not implemented at all; this suggests that the presence of a dictatorial leader in public goods with punishment can be beneficial only when there is communication.
Keywords:	Voluntary contribution experiment, Leadership, Punishment
JEL:	C72 C92 H41 O12

Going Green : Framing Effects in a Dynamic Coordination Game

Going Green : Framing Effects in a Dynamic Coordination Game

Date:	2015
By:	Gerlagh, Reyer (Tilburg University, Center For Economic Research) van der Heijden, Eline (Tilburg University, Center For Economic Research)
URL:	http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:tiu:tiucen:c3b6b46c-0fb0-4098-8251-d271d17b23e2&r=net
	We experimentally study decision-making in a novel dynamic coordination game. The game captures features of a transition between externality networks. Groups consisting of three subjects start in a stable benchmark equilibrium with network externality. Over seven rounds, they can transit to an alternative stable equilibrium based on the other network. The alternative network has higher payoffs, but the transition is slow and costly. Coordination is required to implement the transition while minimizing costs.<br/>In the experiment, the game is repeated five times, which enables groups to learn to coordinate over time. We compare a neutral language treatment with a ‘green framing’ treatment, in which meaningful context is added to the instructions. We find the green framing to significantly increase the number of profitable transitions, but also to inhibit the learning from past experiences, and thus it reduces coherence of strategies. Consequently, payoffs in both treatments are similar even though the green framing results in twice as many transitions.<br/>In the context of environmental policy, the experiment suggests general support for ‘going green’, but we also find evidence for anchoring of beliefs by green framing; proponents and opponents stick to their initial strategies.
Keywords:	cost of transition; lab experiment; dynamic stag hunt game; framing
JEL:	C73 C92 O44

Expert Information and Majority Decisions

Expert Information and Majority Decisions

==notes by yinung==

又出現有關 group decision 的研究:

* 專家意見的影響 (在人數多的委員會不佳)

*多數決

Date:	2015-09-23
By:	Kohei Kawamura Vasileios Vlaseros
URL:	http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:edn:esedps:261&r=net
	This paper shows theoretically and experimentally that hearing expert opinions can be a double-edged sword for collective decision making. We present a majoritarian voting game of common interest where committee members receive not only private information, but also expert information that is more accurate than private information and observed by all members. In theory, there are Bayesian Nash equilibria where the committee members’ voting strategy incorporates both types of information and access to expert information enhances the efficiency of the majority decision. However, there is also a class of potentially inefficient equilibria where a supermajority always follow expert information and the majority decision does not aggregate private information. In the laboratory, the majority decisions and the subjects’ voting behaviour were largely consistent with those in the class of inefficient equilibria. We found a large efficiency loss due to the presence of expert information especially when the committee size was large. We suggest that it may be desirable for expert information to be revealed only to a subset of committee members.
Keywords:	committee decision making, voting experiment, expert information, strategic voting
JEL:	C92 D72 D82

Trading in Networks: a Classroom Experiment

Trading in Networks: a Classroom Experiment

==noted by yinung==

分組, 在圈形的網路 topoloty 中, 隨機選兩組進行貿易, 但 transport 經過各組 node 時要付費

===參考===

• S. Choi, A. Galeotti, S. Goyal.Trading in networks: theory and experiments, -Cambridge-INET Working Paper, 2014
• M. Kosfeld. Economic Networks in the Laboratory: A Survey, Institute for Empirical Research
  in Economics, University of Zurich, 2015.

Date:	2015-10
By:	Paul Johnson (Department of Economics and Public Policy, University of Alaska Anchorage) Qiujie Zheng (Department of Economics and Public Policy, University of Alaska Anchorage)
URL:	http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:ala:wpaper:2015-03&r=net
	This paper describes a classroom experiment that demonstrates coordination and competition between traders in a network. Students test theoretical predictions concerning the emergence of equilibrium and the division of surplus between buyers and sellers. The experiment is appropriate for use in teaching intermediate microeconomics, industrial organization, transportation economics and game theory.
Keywords:	Experimental Economics, Classroom Experiment, Trading in Networks
JEL:	A22 B21 C92