We present evidence from a natural field experiment designed to shed light on whether individual behavior is consistent with a neoclassical model of utility maximization subject to budget constraints. We do this through the lens of a field experiment on charitable giving. We find that the...

We report on experiments to replicate Plott and Zeiler's (2005) findings that the WTP-WTA gap disappears when using procedures that are aimed at reducing misunderstandings, such as training rounds for the BDM mechanism. Following the design by Plott and Zeiler (2005) and Isoni, Loomes, and...

We investigate the possibility that a decision-maker prefers to avoid making a decision and instead delegates it to an external device, e.g., a coin flip. In a series of experiments our participants often choose a stochastically dominated lottery between outcomes, contradicting most theories of...

We elicit concern for animal welfare in an incentivized, direct and real setup that allows us to separate genuine interest in animal welfare from confounding factors like advertisement, replacement arguments or image concerns. Subjects choose between intensive farming and organic living...

We use a range of dictator game experiments to investigate whether people avoid information altruistically. After learning about a product with positive externalities, a consumer may avoid learning the cost of the product so that she does not hesitate to act altruistically. We find that although...

A large body of evidence suggests that people are willing to sacrifice personal material gain in order to adhere to a moral motive such as fairness or truth-telling. Yet less is known about what happens when moral motives are in conflict. We hypothesize that in such situations, individuals...

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...

Whether pro-social preferences identified in economic laboratories survive in natural market contexts is an important and contested issue. We find that the willingness to buy at a higher price when higher wages are paid to the worker in a laboratory experiment framed as a market exchange...

We measure risk attitudes in 30 different countries in a controlled, incentivized experiment (N = 3025). At the macroeconomic level, we find a strong and highly significant negative correlation between the risk tolerance of a country and income per capita. This gives rise to a paradox, seen that...

We study how institutional design influences moral transgression. People are heterogeneous in their feelings of guilt and can share guilt with others. Institutions determine the number of supporters necessary for immoral outcomes to occur. With more supporters required, every supporter can share...