Paper #437

Título:

Retribution in a cheap-talk experiment

Autores:

Jordi Brandts y Gary Charness

Fecha:

Diciembre 1999

Resumen:

We use a two-person 3-stage game to investigate whether people choose to punish or reward another player by sacrificing money to increase or decrease the other person's payoff. One player sends a message indicating an intended play, which is either favorable or unfavorable to the other player in the game. After the message, the sender and the receiver play a simultaneous 2x2 game. A deceptive message may be made, in an effort to induce the receiver to make a play favorable to the sender. Our focus is on whether receivers' rates of monetary sacrifice depend on the process and the perceived sender's intention, as is suggested by the literature on deception and procedural satisfaction. Models such as Rabin (1993), Sen (1997), and Charness and Rabin (1999) also permit rates of sacrifice to be sensitive to the sender's perceived intention, while outcome-based models such as Fehr and Schmidt (1999) and Bolton and Ockenfels (1997) predict otherwise. We find that deception substantially increases the punishment rate as a response to an action that is unfavorable to the receiver. We also find that a small but significant percentage of subjects choose to reward a favorable action choice made by the sender.

Palabras clave:

Deception, experiment, fair process, intention, punishment, reciprocity, Leex

Códigos JEL:

A13, C91, D81, M14

Área de investigación:

Economía Experimental y del Comportamiento

Publicado en:

Management Science, Vol 49, No. 1, January 2003
Con el título:
Truth or Consequences

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