Prosocial Behavior and the Individual Normative Standard of Fairness within a Dynamic Context: Experimental Evidence

Mekvabishvili, Rati and Mekvabishvili, Elguja and Natsvaladze, Marine and Sirbiladze, Rusudan and Mzhavanadze, Giorgi and Deisadze, Salome (2023): Prosocial Behavior and the Individual Normative Standard of Fairness within a Dynamic Context: Experimental Evidence. Published in: Open Journal of Social Sciences , Vol. 3, No. 11 (20 March 2023): pp. 204-221.

Abstract

In this paper, we present an experimental study of prosocial behavior and individual normative standards of fairness under the novel context of a dynamic dictator game. In addition, we explore the role of informal institutions in shaping individuals’ cooperation within the domain of a public goods game under its direct exposure and in subsequent prosociality beyond its reach in the domain of the dictator game. We find that dictators’ average offers in our study are quite close to the typical results found in other dictator game experiments and they are quite stable over two periods. However, dictators become more selfish after they have had the experience of playing a public goods game with peer punishment. Interestingly, we found that dictators act significantly more selfishly relative to their own declared individual normative standard of fairness. Furthermore, our experiment reveals a large share of antisocial punishment in the public goods game and a peer-to-peer punishment mechanism to be an inefficient tool to promote cooperation, however in an environment that rules out a suitable normative consensus and collective choice.

• Item Type: MPRA Paper
• Language: English
• Keywords: dictator game; individual normative standard of fairness; dynamics of behavior; spillover; prosociality; public goods game
• Subjects: C - Mathematical and Quantitative Methods > C7 - Game Theory and Bargaining Theory > C73 - Stochastic and Dynamic Games ; Evolutionary Games ; Repeated Games; C - Mathematical and Quantitative Methods > C9 - Design of Experiments > C92 - Laboratory, Group Behavior; D - Microeconomics > D0 - General > D02 - Institutions: Design, Formation, Operations, and Impact; H - Public Economics > H4 - Publicly Provided Goods > H41 - Public Goods

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Mekvabishvili Rati, Mekvabishvili Elguja, Natsvaladze Marine, Sirbiladze Rusudan, Mzhavanadze Giorgi & Diesadze Salome (2022). Prosocial Behavior and the Individual Normative Standard of Fairness within a Dynamic Context: Experimental Evidence. Zenodo data repository, https://doi.org/10.5281/zenodo.7476668

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