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Efficiency, equality, positionality: What do people maximize? Experimental vs. hypothetical evidence from Tunisia

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  • El Harbi, Sana
  • Bekir, Insaf
  • Grolleau, Gilles
  • Sutan, Angela
Abstract
We experimentally test in a developing country whether people prefer a situation where individual and social interests coincide, a situation promoting equality or another one promoting a better relative position. We also investigate whether incentive compatible choices are consistent with results obtained by hypothetical surveys and whether results remain robust when higher stakes are considered. Our results show when stakes are low, a similar proportion of individuals (about 40%) choose the option that maximizes self-interest and social good and the option that promotes equality. Our findings suggest that hypothetical surveys may lead individuals to overestimate positional concerns and to be insensitive to stakes. In presence of higher stakes, egalitarian concerns prevail in incentive compatible experiments.

Suggested Citation

  • El Harbi, Sana & Bekir, Insaf & Grolleau, Gilles & Sutan, Angela, 2015. "Efficiency, equality, positionality: What do people maximize? Experimental vs. hypothetical evidence from Tunisia," Journal of Economic Psychology, Elsevier, vol. 47(C), pages 77-84.
    • Handle: RePEc:eee:joepsy:v:47:y:2015:i:c:p:77-84
    DOI: 10.1016/j.joep.2015.01.007
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    Cited by:

    1. Clot, Sophie & Grolleau, Gilles & Ibanez, Lisette, 2018. "Shall we pay all? An experimental test of Random Incentivized Systems," Journal of Behavioral and Experimental Economics (formerly The Journal of Socio-Economics), Elsevier, vol. 73(C), pages 93-98.
    2. Long Huang & Wansheng Lei & Fuming Xu & Hairong Liu & Liang Yu & Fujun Shi & Lei Wang, 2020. "Maxims nudge equitable or efficient choices in a Trade-Off Game," PLOS ONE, Public Library of Science, vol. 15(6), pages 1-13, June.
    3. Grolleau, Gilles & Meunier, Luc & Mzoughi, Naoufel, 2023. "Polluting for (higher) profits: Does an economic gain influence moral judgment of environmental wrongdoings?," Ecological Economics, Elsevier, vol. 213(C).
    4. Larney, Andrea & Rotella, Amanda & Barclay, Pat, 2019. "Stake size effects in ultimatum game and dictator game offers: A meta-analysis," Organizational Behavior and Human Decision Processes, Elsevier, vol. 151(C), pages 61-72.
    5. Terence C. Burnham, 2016. "Economics and evolutionary mismatch: humans in novel settings do not maximize," Journal of Bioeconomics, Springer, vol. 18(3), pages 195-209, October.
    6. Pellegrin, Claire & Grolleau, Gilles & Mzoughi, Naoufel & Napoleone, Claude, 2018. "Does the Identifiable Victim Effect Matter for Plants? Results From a Quasi-experimental Survey of French Farmers," Ecological Economics, Elsevier, vol. 151(C), pages 106-113.
    7. Barbara, Latifa & Grolleau, Gilles & Houfaf Khoufaf, Assia & Meriane, Youcef & Mzoughi, Naoufel, 2018. "Positional concerns and framing effects in financial preferences," The Quarterly Review of Economics and Finance, Elsevier, vol. 68(C), pages 183-189.
    8. Jérémy Celse, 2018. "Do You Enjoy Having More Than Others or More Than Another? Exploring the Relationship Between Relative Concerns and the Size of the Reference Group," Social Indicators Research: An International and Interdisciplinary Journal for Quality-of-Life Measurement, Springer, vol. 138(3), pages 1089-1118, August.
    9. Colin F. Camerer & Gideon Nave & Alec Smith, 2019. "Dynamic Unstructured Bargaining with Private Information: Theory, Experiment, and Outcome Prediction via Machine Learning," Management Science, INFORMS, vol. 65(4), pages 1867-1890, April.
    10. Adam Ayaita & Kerstin Pull, 2022. "Positional preferences and narcissism: evidence from ‘money burning’ dictator games," Applied Economics Letters, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 29(3), pages 267-271, February.

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    More about this item

    Keywords

    Equality; Hypothetical; Positional concerns; Stakes;
    All these keywords.

    JEL classification:

    • D63 - Microeconomics - - Welfare Economics - - - Equity, Justice, Inequality, and Other Normative Criteria and Measurement
    • C91 - Mathematical and Quantitative Methods - - Design of Experiments - - - Laboratory, Individual Behavior

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