Hostname: page-component-7b9c58cd5d-dkgms Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2025-03-16T08:23:28.534Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false

‘Give me a chance!’ An experiment in social decision under risk

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  14 March 2025

Michal Krawczyk*
Affiliation:
Faculty of Economic Sciences, University of Warsaw, 44/50 Dluga, 00-241 Warsaw, Poland
Fabrice Le Lec*
Affiliation:
Lille Economics and Management UMR CNRS 8179, Catholic University of Lille, 41 rue du Port, 59000 Lille, France

Abstract

This paper reports the results of a ‘probabilistic dictator game’ experiment in which subjects were given an option to share chances to win a prize with a dummy player. Using a within-subject design we manipulated two aspects of the decision, the relative cost of sharing and the nature of the lottery: the draws were either independent for the two players (‘noncompetitive’ condition) or one's success meant other's failure (‘competitive’ condition). We also asked for decisions in a standard, non-probabilistic, setting. The main results can be summarized as follows: first, a substantial fraction of subjects do share chances to win, also in the competitive treatments, thus showing concern for the other player that cannot be explained by outcome-based models. Second, subjects share less in the competitive treatment than in other treatments, indicating that procedural fairness alone cannot explain the data. Overall, these results suggest that models aiming at generalizing social concerns to risky environments will have to rely on a mix of distributive and procedural fairness.

Type
Research Article
Copyright
Copyright © Economic Science Association 2010

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

References

Andersen, S., Harrsion, G., Lau, M., & Rutstrom, E. (2006). Elicitation using multiple price list formats. Experimental Economics, 9, 383405.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Andreoni, J., & Miller, J. (2002). Giving according to GARP: an experimental test of the consistency of preferences for altruism. Econometrica, 70, 737754.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Bolton, G. E., & Ockenfels, A. (2000). ERC: a theory of equity, reciprocity and competition. American Economic Review, 90, 166193.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Bolton, G. E., Brandts, J., & Ockenfels, A. (2005). Fair procedures: evidence from games involving lotteries. Economic Journal, 115, 10541076.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Brennan, G., Güth, W., Gonzalez, L., & Levati, M. V. (2008). Attitudes toward private and collective risks in individual and strategic choice situations. Journal of Economic Behavior and Organization.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Charness, G., & Rabin, M. (2002). Understanding social preferences with simple tests. Quartely Journal of Economics, 117, 817869.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Dana, J., Weber, R., & Kuang, J. (2007). Exploiting moral wriggle room: experiments demonstrating an illusory preference for fairness. Economic Theory, 33, 6780.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Engelmann, D., & Strobel, M. (2004). Inequality aversion, efficiency, and maximin preferences in simple distribution experiments. American Economic Review, 94, 857869.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Fehr, E., & Schmidt, K. M. (1999). A theory of fairness, competition, and cooperation. Quarterly Journal of Economics, 114, 817868.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Fischbacher, U. (2007). z-Tree: Zurich toolbox for ready-made economic experiments. Experimental Economics, 10, 171178.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Gächter, S., & Riedl, A. (2005). Moral property rights in bargaining with infeasible claims. Management Science, 51, 249263.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Güth, W., Levati, V., & Ploner, M. (2008). On the social dimension of time and risk preferences: an experimental study. Economic inquiry, 46, 261272.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Karni, E., Salmon, T., & Sopher, B. (2008). Individual sense of fairness: an experimental study. Experimental Economics, 11, 174179.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Koch, A. K., & Normann, H.-T. (2008). Giving in dictator games: regard for others or regard by others? Southern Economic Journal, 75, 223231.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Monin, B., & Miller, D. (2001). Moral credentials and the expression of prejudice. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 81, 3343.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Murnighan, J. K., Oeschb, J. M., & Pillutlac, M. (2001). Player types and self-impression management in dictatorship games: two experiments. Games and Economic Behavior, 37, 388414.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Trautmann, S. (2009). A tractable model of process fairness under risk. Journal of Economic Psychology, 30, 803813.CrossRefGoogle Scholar