This paper provides strong evidence supporting the long-standing speculation that decision-making in groups has a dark side, by magnifying the prevalence of anti-social behavior towards outsiders. A large-scale experiment implemented in Slovakia and Uganda (N=2,309) reveals that deciding in a...

This paper provides strong evidence supporting the long-standing speculation that decision-making in groups has a dark side, by magnifying the prevalence of anti-social behavior towards outsiders. A large-scale experiment implemented in Slovakia and Uganda (N=2,309) reveals that deciding in a...

We report experimental findings on the role of charitable promises in bargaining settings. We vary the enforceability of such promises within variants of ultimatum games where the proposer suggest a split between himself, the responder and a charitable donation. By reneging on initial pledges,...

We systematically examine the acute impact of exposure to a public health crisis on multiple dimensions of economic decision making and social preferences using unique experimental panel data collected just before and immediately after the outbreak of COVID-19 in China. Exploiting the...

We conducted a field experiment in the natural setting of blood donations to test how oxytocin relates to empathy and altruism. We randomly assigned blood donors in the Croatian Institute for Transfusion Medicine to three groups with the aim to induce different levels of empathy by showing a...

Subsidizing charitable giving, for example, for victims of natural disasters, is very popular, not only with governments but also with private organizations. Many companies, for example, match their employees' charitable contributions, hoping that this will foster the willingness to contribute....

This paper tests the effect of a matching mechanism on donations in a controlled field experiment. We match the donations of students at the University of Zurich who, each semester, have to decide whether they wish to contribute to two Social Funds. Our results support the hypothesis that a...

Individuals engage in daily behaviours that are often at issue with self-interest and rationality. This paper supports the thesis of inadequacy of the homo oeconomicus model, providing results of a field experiment conducted in the city of Naples (Italy) on the practice of “suspended coffee”...

We present evidence from a natural field experiment designed to shed light on the efficacy of fundraising schemes in which donations are matched by a lead donor. In conjunction with the Bavarian State Opera House, we mailed 14,000 regular opera attendees a letter describing a charitable...

A natural field experiment is designed to explore the crowding effects of a timely feedback system on voluntary contributions according to their original dominant motivation (intrinsic/extrinsic). This paper finds crowding-in effect of a one-way timely feedback for both types of volunteers....