We develop a simple model of generous behavior. It is based on the premise that some people are generous, but everyone wants to appear generous--especially in the eyes of other generous people. Although non-monetary donations are always inefficient, they frequently occur in equilibrium because...

Many previous experiments document that behavior in multi-person settings responds to the name of the game and the labeling of strategies. With a few exceptions, these studies cannot tell whether frames affect preferences or beliefs. In three large experiments, we investigate whether social...

We find that the actual willingness to pay for various consumer goods can be manipulated by an uninformative anchor, replicating Ariely et al. (2003). We furthermore demonstrate that the anchoring effect decreases but does not vanish with higher cognitive ability.

We experimentally investigate the effect of cheap talk in a bargaining game with one-sided asymmetric information. A seller has private information about her skill and is provided an opportunity to communicate this information to a buyer through a written message. Four different treatments are...

In a one-shot Prisoners’ dilemma experiment, female participants are highly sensitive to the social frame. Male participants are not.

In an otherwise neutrally described Prisonersʼ dilemma experiment, we document that behavior is more likely to be cooperative when the game is called the Community Game than when it is called the Stock Market Game. However, the difference vanishes when only one of the subjects is in control of...

We develop a simple model of generous behavior. It is based on the premise that some people are generous, but everyone wants to appear generous—especially in the eyes of other generous people. Although non-monetary donations are always inefficient, they frequently occur in equilibrium because...