Experimental research on generosity has focused predominantly on behavior in the monetary domain, although many real life decisions take place in the non-monetary domain. Investigating generosity preferences in the non-monetary domain is important to understand a large class of situations...

Using a laboratory experiment, we present first evidence that social image concerns causally reduce the take -up of an individual ly beneficial transfer. Our design manipulates the informativeness of the take- up decision by varying whether transfer eligibility is based on ability or luck, and...

Altruistic punishment is often thought to be a major enforcement mechanism of social norms. I present experimental results from a modified version of the dictator game with third-party punishment, in which third parties can remain ignorant about the choice of the dictator. I find that a...

The matching literature commonly rules out that market design itself shapes agent preferences. Underlying this premise is the assumption that agents know their own preferences at the outset and that preferences do not change throughout the matching process. Under this assumption, a centralized...

We consider a simple model of the competitive screening of students by schools and colleges. Students apply to schools which then perform costly screening procedures of the applicants to select those with high ability. Students who receive more than one offer may choose among those. Colleges...

Ample evidence shows that certain words or ways of phrasing things can cause us to change our preferences. We demonstrate one mechanism for why this happens – "framing" evokes norms which then influence choice. We use a laboratory study to test the impact of describing a series of dictator...