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on Evolutionary Economics |
| By: | Goette, Lorenz (University of Lausanne); Huffman, David (Swarthmore College); Meier, Stephan (Columbia University); Sutter, Matthias (University of Innsbruck) |
| Abstract: | We investigate how group boundaries, and the economic environment surrounding groups, affect altruistic cooperation and punishment behavior. Our study uses experiments conducted with 525 officers in the Swiss Army, and exploits random assignment to platoons. We find that, without competition between groups, individuals are more prone to cooperate altruistically in a prisoner's dilemma game with in-group as opposed to out-group members. They also use a costly punishment option to selectively harm those who defect, encouraging a norm of cooperation towards the group. Adding competition between groups causes even stronger in-group cooperation, but also a qualitative change in punishment: punishment becomes antisocial, harming cooperative and defecting out-group members alike. These findings support recent evolutionary models and have important organizational implications. |
| Keywords: | group membership, competition, punishment, army, experiment |
| JEL: | C72 C91 C93 |
| Date: | 2010–09 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:iza:izadps:dp5189&r=evo |
| By: | Joseph Henrich; Steve J. Heine; Ara Norenzayan |
| Abstract: | Behavioral scientists routinely publish broad claims about human psychology and behavior in the world’s top journals based on samples drawn entirely from Western, Educated, Industrialized, Rich and Democratic (WEIRD) societies. Researchers—often implicitly—assume that either there is little variation across human populations, or that these “standard subjects” are as representative of the species as any other population. Are these assumptions justified? Here, our review of the comparative database from across the behavioral sciences suggests both that there is substantial variability in experimental results across populations and that WEIRD subjects are particularly unusual compared with the rest of the species—frequent outliers. The domains reviewed include visual perception, fairness, cooperation, spatial reasoning, categorization and inferential induction, moral reasoning, reasoning styles, selfconcepts and related motivations, and the heritability of IQ. The findings suggest that members of WEIRD societies, including young children, are among the least representative populations one could find for generalizing about humans. Many of these findings involve domains that are associated with fundamental aspects of psychology, motivation, and behavior—hence, there are no obvious a priori grounds for claiming that a particular behavioral phenomenon is universal based on sampling from a single subpopulation. Overall, these empirical patterns suggests that we need to be less cavalier in addressing questions of human nature on the basis of data drawn from this particularly thin, and rather unusual, slice of humanity. We close by proposing ways to structurally re-organize the behavioral sciences to best tackle these challenges. |
| Keywords: | external validity, population variability, experiments, cross-cultural research, culture, human universals, generalizability, evolutionary psychology, cultural psychology, behavioral economics |
| Date: | 2010 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:rsw:rswwps:rswwps139&r=evo |
| By: | Rainer Schnell |
| Abstract: | Social scientists have long virtually ignored the biological constraints of human behavior. Yet if the prediction of behavior is considered essential to a social science, neglecting any variable that might influence human behavior is unacceptable. This paper provides examples of important biological variables and describes their measurement in social surveys. |
| Date: | 2010 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:rsw:rswwps:rswwps138&r=evo |
| By: | Masclet, David (University of Rennes); Noussair, Charles N. (Tilburg University); Villeval, Marie Claire (CNRS, GATE) |
| Abstract: | Experimental studies of social dilemmas have shown that while the existence of a sanctioning institution improves cooperation within groups, it also has a detrimental impact on group earnings in the short run. Could the introduction of pre-play threats to punish have enough of a beneficial impact on cooperation, while not incurring the cost associated with actual punishment, so that they increase overall welfare? We report an experiment in which players can issue non-binding threats to punish others based on their contribution levels to a public good. After observing others’ actual contributions, they choose their actual punishment level. We find that threats increase the level of contributions significantly. Efficiency is improved, but only in the long run. However, the possibility of sanctioning differences between threatened and actual punishment leads to lower threats, cooperation and welfare, restoring them to levels equal to or below the levels attained in the absence of threats. |
| Keywords: | threats, cheap talk, sanctions, public good, experiment |
| JEL: | C92 H41 D63 |
| Date: | 2010–09 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:iza:izadps:dp5206&r=evo |
| By: | Pablo Brañas-Garza (Department of Economic Theory and Economic History, University of Granada.); Olusegun A. Oyediran (Department of Economic Theory and Economic History, University of Granada.); M.Fernanda Rivas (University of Granada.) |
| Abstract: | This paper o¤ers two related issues: (i ) an applications of beliefs about the cooperative behavior of others to policy-oriented issues, (ii ) a method of explor- ing prejudices (toward others) where interviewees are oblivious of its purpose. We studied contributions and guesses about others?contributions through an experimental game. Prejudice is examined as an implicitly held belief by a Spanish college student towards any of the speci?ed foreign population groups (i.e. the Asians, the Africans, the Latin Americans and the Westerners). The results show that: at the individual level, there exists some subjects that harbor strong positive (and negative) prejudices toward the foreigners. The prejudice models ?tted also show that: own contributions, femaleness, individual wealth; and beliefs about income status, cultural status, religious intensity, societal co- operation and political orientation have strong in?uences on racial prejudice. |
| Keywords: | Beliefs, Prejudice, Public Goods Game |
| Date: | 2010–08–01 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:gra:wpaper:10/04&r=evo |
| By: | Gerasimou, Georgios |
| Abstract: | This paper proposes and characterises two preference-based choice rules that allow the decision maker to choose nothing if the criteria associated with them are satisfied by no feasible alternative. Strict preferences are primitive in the first rule and weak preferences in the second. Each of them includes the corresponding utility-maximisation theory of rational choice as a special case. The first one explains changes in the magnitude of context effects observed in experiments that allow for indecision. The second offers one explanation of experimental findings suggesting that choice is more likely to be made from small rather than from large sets. The general conclusion in both cases is that an individual conforms to meaningful and testable principles of choice consistency whenever assumed to be occasionally indecisive. |
| Keywords: | Rationality; indecision; incomplete preferences; choice rules |
| JEL: | D11 D01 |
| Date: | 2010–09–27 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:pra:mprapa:25481&r=evo |
| By: | Thomas Epper; Helga Fehr-Duda; Adrian Bruhin |
| Abstract: | A large body of experimental research has demonstrated that, on average, people violate the axioms of expected utility theory as well as of discounted utility theory. In particular, aggregate behavior is best characterized by probability distortions and hyperbolic discounting. But is it the same people who are prone to these behaviors? Based on an experiment with salient monetary incentives we demonstrate that there is a strong and significant relationship between greater departures from linear probability weighting and the degree of decreasing discount rates at the level of individual behavior. We argue that this relationship can be rationalized by the uncertainty inherent in any future event, linking discounting behavior directly to risk preferences. Consequently, decreasing discount rates may be generated by people's proneness to probability distortions. |
| Keywords: | Time preferences, risk preferences, hyperbolic discounting, probability weighting, institutionally generated uncertainty |
| JEL: | D01 D81 D91 |
| Date: | 2010–09 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:zur:iewwpx:510&r=evo |
| By: | Gorodnichenko, Yuriy (University of California, Berkeley); Roland, Gerald (University of California, Berkeley) |
| Abstract: | We construct an endogenous growth model that includes a cultural variable along the dimension of individualism-collectivism. The model predicts that more individualism leads to more innovation because of the social rewards associated with innovation in an individualist culture. This cultural effect may offset the negative effects of bad institutions on growth. Collectivism leads to efficiency gains relative to individualism, but these gains are static, unlike the dynamic effect of individualism on growth through innovation. Using genetic data as instruments for culture we provide strong evidence of a causal effect of individualism on income per worker and total factor productivity as well as on innovation. The baseline genetic markers we use are interpreted as proxies for cultural transmission but others have a direct effect on individualism and collectivism, in line with recent advances in biology and neuro-science. The effect of culture on long-run growth remains very robust even after controlling for the effect of institutions and other factors. We also provide evidence of a two-way causal effect between culture and institutions. |
| Keywords: | culture, institutions, development, growth |
| JEL: | O1 O3 O4 O5 |
| Date: | 2010–09 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:iza:izadps:dp5187&r=evo |