We examine peer effects in risk taking with complete information and compare explanations for peer effects based on relative payoff concerns to explanations that allow peer choices to matter. We vary experimentally whether individuals can condition a simple lottery choice on the lottery choice,...

We show that choices in competitive behavior may entail a gender wage gap. In our experi ments, employees first choose a remuneration scheme (competitive tournament vs. piece rate) and then conduct a real-effort task. Employers know the pie size the employee has generated, the remuneration...

We study the voluntary revelation of private information in a labor-market experiment where workers can reveal their productivity at a cost. While rational revelation improves a worker's payoff, it imposes a negative externality on others and may trigger further revelation. Such unraveling can...

In most laboratory experiments concerning prosocial behavior subjects are fully informed how their decision influences the payoff of other players. Outside the laboratory, however, individuals typically have to decide without such detailed knowledge. To assess the effect of information...

We experimentally compare the incentive effects of rewarding individuals for outstanding performance publicly versus privately. We implement two real-effort tasks, which differ in how prestigious subjects perceive working on them. In both tasks private and public feedback similarly enhances...

Becker’s theory of taste-based discrimination predicts that relative employment of the discriminated social group will improve if there is a decrease in the level of prejudice for the marginally discriminating employer. In this paper we experimentally test this prediction offered by Becker...

In this paper we experimentally investigate whether partial coercion can in combination with conditional cooperation increase contributions to a public good. We are especially interested in the behavior of the non-coerced populations. The main finding is that in our setting conditional...

How do people react to setbacks and successes? I introduce a new measure of challenge-seeking to determine the effect of winning and losing in a competition on the willingness to seek further challenges. Participants in a lab experiment compete in two-person tournaments and are then informed of...

Although reciprocity is a key concept in the social sciences, it is still unclear why people engage in costly reciprocation. In this study, physiological and self-report measures were employed to investigate the role of emotions, using the Power-to-Take Game. In this 2-person game, player 1 can...