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Detecting motives for cooperation in public goods experiments

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  14 March 2025

Takafumi Yamakawa ,
Yoshitaka Okano  and
Tatsuyoshi Saijo
Takafumi Yamakawa*
Affiliation:
Institute of Social and Economic Research, Osaka University, 6-1 Mihogaoka, Ibaraki, Osaka 567-0047, Japan
Yoshitaka Okano*
Affiliation:
School of Economics and Management, Kochi University of Technology, 2-22 Eikokujicho, Kochi 780-8515, Japan
Tatsuyoshi Saijo*
Affiliation:
Research Center for Social Design Engineering, Kochi University of Technology, 2-22 Eikokujicho, Kochi 780-8515, Japan Center for Environmental Innovation Design for Sustainability, Osaka University, 2-1 Yamadaoka, Suita, Osaka 565-0871, Japan Institute of Economic Research, Hitotsubashi University, 2-1 Naka, Kunitachi, Tokyo 186-8601, Japan
*
[email protected]
[email protected]
[email protected]
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Abstract

This study clarifies the types of motives that are important as a source of cooperation in a linear public goods experiment. Our experimental design separates contributions into those due to confusion, one-shot motives (which includes altruism, warm-glow, inequality aversion, and conditional cooperation), and multi-round motives (which includes a strategic motive under incomplete information, a failure of backward induction, and reciprocity). The experiment reveals that multi-round motives plays an important role in driving cooperative behavior. Confusion and one-shot motives play a minor role.

Keywords

CooperationMotivesPublic goods

JEL classification

H41: Public Goods C92: Laboratory, Group Behavior C72: Noncooperative Games
Type
Original Paper
Information
Experimental Economics , Volume 19 , Issue 2 , June 2016 , pp. 500 - 512
Copyright
Copyright © 2015 Economic Science Association

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Footnotes

Electronic supplementary material The online version of this article (doi:https://doi.org/10.1007/s10683-015-9451-2) contains supplementary material, which is available to authorized users.

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