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Ex-post blindness as excuse? The effect of information disclosure on giving

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  • Kandul, Serhiy

Abstract

People passing by beggars without leaving a penny are not necessarily pure money-maximizers. In the world of sincere and dishonest recipients, some donors might anticipate the disutility they will suffer at the moment they realize their help is misdirected and reduce their willingness to donate to avoid these psychological costs. I employ a dictator game with ex-ante uncertainty about recipient’s endowment and requests from recipients to study how donors react to ex-post revelation of recipient’s type. I observe no difference in donations with and without ex-post information about recipient’s endowment. However, if donors could choose if they want to receive such information themselves, nearly a third of dictators choose to remain ignorant. Those dictators who choose to ex-post reveal the endowment of the recipient give significantly more.

Suggested Citation

  • Kandul, Serhiy, 2016. "Ex-post blindness as excuse? The effect of information disclosure on giving," Journal of Economic Psychology, Elsevier, vol. 52(C), pages 91-101.
    • Handle: RePEc:eee:joepsy:v:52:y:2016:i:c:p:91-101
    DOI: 10.1016/j.joep.2015.11.006
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    Cited by:

    1. Friedrichsen, Jana & Momsen, Katharina & Piasenti, Stefano, 2022. "Ignorance, intention and stochastic outcomes☆," Journal of Behavioral and Experimental Economics (formerly The Journal of Socio-Economics), Elsevier, vol. 100(C).
    2. Robert Stüber, 2020. "The benefit of the doubt: willful ignorance and altruistic punishment," Experimental Economics, Springer;Economic Science Association, vol. 23(3), pages 848-872, September.
    3. Friedrichsen, Jana & Momsen, Katharina & Piasenti, Stefano, 2022. "Ignorance, intention and stochastic outcomes," EconStor Open Access Articles and Book Chapters, ZBW - Leibniz Information Centre for Economics, vol. 100, pages 1-1.
    4. Stüber, Robert, 2019. "The benefit of the doubt: Willful ignorance and altruistic punishment," Discussion Papers, Research Unit: Market Behavior SP II 2019-215, WZB Berlin Social Science Center.
    5. Satoshi Taguchi & Yoshio Kamijo, 2018. "Intentions behind disclosure to promote trust under short-termism: An experimental study," Working Papers SDES-2018-8, Kochi University of Technology, School of Economics and Management, revised Oct 2018.

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    More about this item

    Keywords

    Prosocial behavior; Self-image; Ignorance; Ex-post disclosure;
    All these keywords.

    JEL classification:

    • C91 - Mathematical and Quantitative Methods - - Design of Experiments - - - Laboratory, Individual Behavior
    • D03 - Microeconomics - - General - - - Behavioral Microeconomics: Underlying Principles

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