We study ultimatum and dictator environments with one-way, unenforceable pre-play communication from the proposer to the recipient, semantically framed as a promise. After observing this promise regarding how much the proposer will offer if selected, in our treatment conditions, recipients...

Do contracts provide reference points that affect ex post behavior? We address this question in a canonical buyer-seller relationship with renegotiation. Our paper provides causal experimental evidence that an initial contract has a highly significant and economically important impact on...

How does an ex ante contract affect behavior in an ex post renegotiation game? We address this question in a canonical buyer-seller relationship with renegotiation. Our paper provides causal experimental evidence that an initial contract has a highly significant and economically important impact...

The ultimatum game is a sequential-move bargaining game in which a “giver” offers a “taker” a share of a monetary pie. The predicted subgame perfect equilibrium is for rational givers to offer the smallest possible share, and for rational takers to accept. Experimental trials conducted...

We conduct an experiment in which subjects play an ultimatum game but, rather than bargaining over money, they bargain over lottery tickets for a prize. Compared to the standard ultimatum game, proposers offer a significantly lower percentage of lottery tickets, which is inconsistent with either...

Depending on the context at hand, people's preference for receiving feedback might differ. Especially in allocation decisions that directly concern another individual, feedback from the affected person can have positive or negative value. We study such preferences in a laboratory experiment by...

This paper presents an analysis of general time preferences in the canonical Rubinstein (1982) model of bargaining, allowing for arbitrarily history-dependent strategies. I derive a simple sufficient structure for optimal punishments and thereby fully characterize (i) the set of equilibrium...

Anticipated verbal feedback in a dictator game has been shown to induce altruistic behavior. However, in the ultimatum game which, apart from generosity, entails a strategic component since a proposer may (rightly) fear that the responder will reject a low offer, it remains an open question...

Offers can increase in the ultimatum game if the recipient can select her proposer, both with non-competitive selection, where the recipient decides whether she wants to play with a single potential proposer, and even more so with competitive selection, where the recipient decides which of two...

In the Ultimatum Game (UG) one player, named “proposer”, has to decide how to allocate a certain amount of money between herself and a “responder”. If the offer is greater than or equal to the responder’s minimum acceptable offer (MAO), then the money is split as proposed, otherwise,...