IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/eee/soceco/v84y2020ics2214804319301788.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

A game-theoretic model of reciprocity and trust that incorporates personality traits

Author

Listed:
  • Guzmán, Ricardo
  • Harrison, Rodrigo
  • Abarca, Nureya
  • Villena, Mauricio G.

Abstract

We propose a game-theoretic model of reciprocity and trust that incorporates personality traits. In the model, positive and negative reciprocity are “reciprocal preferences:” parameters of heterogeneous utility functions that take into account the material welfare of others (positively if they have been kind, negatively if they have been hostile). Trust, on the other hand, is an individual bias that distorts probabilistic beliefs about the trustworthiness of others. Unlike typical game-theoretic models, our model provides an explanation for the heterogeneity of preferences and probabilistic beliefs: a person’s personality traits determine both the parameters of his utility function and the magnitude of his beleif bias. We tested the model experimentally. Subjects completed a psychometric questionnaire that measures three personality traits: positive reciprocity, negative reciprocity, and trust. Subsequently, they played a sequential prisoner’s dilemma with random re-matching and payoffs changing from round to round. From the subjects’ psychometric scores and game behaviors we inferred the relationship between reciprocal preferences, belief biases, and personality. The results confirmed the hypotheses of the model.

Suggested Citation

  • Guzmán, Ricardo & Harrison, Rodrigo & Abarca, Nureya & Villena, Mauricio G., 2020. "A game-theoretic model of reciprocity and trust that incorporates personality traits," Journal of Behavioral and Experimental Economics (formerly The Journal of Socio-Economics), Elsevier, vol. 84(C).
    • Handle: RePEc:eee:soceco:v:84:y:2020:i:c:s2214804319301788
    DOI: 10.1016/j.socec.2019.101497
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S2214804319301788
    Download Restriction: Full text for ScienceDirect subscribers only
    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.1016/j.socec.2019.101497?utm_source=ideas
    LibKey link: if access is restricted and if your library uses this service, LibKey will redirect you to where you can use your library subscription to access this item
    ---><---

    As the access to this document is restricted, you may want to search for a different version of it.

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Jordi Brandts & Gary Charness, 2011. "The strategy versus the direct-response method: a first survey of experimental comparisons," Experimental Economics, Springer;Economic Science Association, vol. 14(3), pages 375-398, September.
    2. Anke Becker & Thomas Deckers & Thomas Dohmen & Armin Falk & Fabian Kosse, 2012. "The Relationship Between Economic Preferences and Psychological Personality Measures," Annual Review of Economics, Annual Reviews, vol. 4(1), pages 453-478, July.
    3. Casari, Marco & Cason, Timothy N., 2009. "The strategy method lowers measured trustworthy behavior," Economics Letters, Elsevier, vol. 103(3), pages 157-159, June.
    4. Kagel, John & McGee, Peter, 2014. "Personality and cooperation in finitely repeated prisoner’s dilemma games," Economics Letters, Elsevier, vol. 124(2), pages 274-277.
    5. Carrasco, José A. & Harrison, Rodrigo & Villena, Mauricio, 2018. "Interdependent preferences and endogenous reciprocity," Journal of Behavioral and Experimental Economics (formerly The Journal of Socio-Economics), Elsevier, vol. 76(C), pages 68-75.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Citations

    Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
    as


    Cited by:

    1. Chowdhury Mohammad Sakib Anwar & Konstantinos Georgalos, 2024. "Position uncertainty in a sequential public goods game: an experiment," Experimental Economics, Springer;Economic Science Association, vol. 27(4), pages 820-853, September.

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Toussaert, Séverine, 2017. "Intention-based reciprocity and signaling of intentions," LSE Research Online Documents on Economics 69803, London School of Economics and Political Science, LSE Library.
    2. Toho Hien & Raphaële Preget & Mabel Tidball, 2021. "Les enchères de contrats agroenvironnementaux : comparaison expérimentale entre contrainte d’objectif et contrainte de budget," Working Papers hal-02378412, HAL.
    3. Lisa R. Anderson & Gregory DeAngelo & Winand Emons & Beth Freeborn & Hannes Lang, 2017. "Penalty Structures And Deterrence In A Two-Stage Model: Experimental Evidence," Economic Inquiry, Western Economic Association International, vol. 55(4), pages 1833-1867, October.
    4. Loukas Balafoutas & Adrian Beck & Rudolf Kerschbamer & Matthias Sutter, 2014. "The hidden costs of tax evasion: collaborative tax evasion in markets for expert services," Economics Working Papers ECO2014/01, European University Institute.
    5. Zubair, Maria & Khanum, Ayesha & Nasir, Marjan, 2018. "Transfer Of Behavioral Traits From Parents To Children: An Experimental Approach," MPRA Paper 92121, University Library of Munich, Germany.
    6. Chiara Nardi, 2018. "Play Versus Strategy Method: Behavior and the Role of Emotions in the Ultimatum Game," Italian Economic Journal: A Continuation of Rivista Italiana degli Economisti and Giornale degli Economisti, Springer;Società Italiana degli Economisti (Italian Economic Association), vol. 4(1), pages 91-106, March.
    7. Maximiano, Sandra & Sloof, Randolph & Sonnemans, Joep, 2013. "Gift exchange and the separation of ownership and control," Games and Economic Behavior, Elsevier, vol. 77(1), pages 41-60.
    8. Pannenberg, Markus & Friehe, Tim & Wedow, Michael, 2015. "Let Bygones be Bygones? Political Regimes and Personalities in Germany," VfS Annual Conference 2015 (Muenster): Economic Development - Theory and Policy 112841, Verein für Socialpolitik / German Economic Association.
    9. Elena Stepanova & Marius Alt & Astrid Hopfensitz, 2024. "Loneliness And Trust: Evidence From A Large-Scale Trust Game Experiment," Working Papers 2420, Groupe d'Analyse et de Théorie Economique Lyon St-Étienne (GATE Lyon St-Étienne), Université de Lyon.
    10. Tim Friehe & Hannah Schildberg-Hörisch, 2018. "Predicting norm enforcement: the individual and joint predictive power of economic preferences, personality, and self-control," European Journal of Law and Economics, Springer, vol. 45(1), pages 127-146, February.
    11. Roxanne Kovacs & Maurice Dunaiski & Matteo M. Galizzi & Gianluca Grimalda & Rafael Hortala‐Vallve & Fabrice Murtin & Louis Putterman, 2024. "The determinants of trust: findings from large, representative samples in six OECD countries," Economica, London School of Economics and Political Science, vol. 91(364), pages 1521-1552, October.
    12. Andreas Ziegler, 2020. "New Ecological Paradigm meets behavioral economics: On the relationship between environmental values and economic preferences," MAGKS Papers on Economics 202020, Philipps-Universität Marburg, Faculty of Business Administration and Economics, Department of Economics (Volkswirtschaftliche Abteilung).
    13. Elena Cettolin & Sigrid Suetens, 2019. "Return on Trust is Lower for Immigrants," The Economic Journal, Royal Economic Society, vol. 129(621), pages 1992-2009.
    14. O'Garra, Tanya & Sisco, Matthew R., 2018. "Redistribution and Social Information (ReSoc)," SocArXiv 28xwv, Center for Open Science.
    15. Carlos Alós-Ferrer & Jaume García-Segarra & Alexander Ritschel, 2018. "The Big Robber Game," ECON - Working Papers 291, Department of Economics - University of Zurich.
    16. Takahiro Endo & Nidhi Srinivas & Yuki Tsuboyama, 2017. "The Role of Meta-organising in Legitimacy Recovery: The Case of Frozen Food Category in Japan," Discussion Paper Series DP2017-10, Research Institute for Economics & Business Administration, Kobe University.
    17. Tim Friehe & Markus Pannenberg & Michael Wedow, 2015. "Let Bygones be Bygones? Socialist Regimes and Personalities in Germany," CESifo Working Paper Series 5440, CESifo.
    18. Alain Cohn & Michel André Maréchal & Frédéric Schneider & Roberto A Weber, 2021. "Frequent Job Changes can Signal Poor Work Attitude and Reduce Employability," Journal of the European Economic Association, European Economic Association, vol. 19(1), pages 475-508.
    19. Banerjee, Ritwik, 2016. "Corruption, norm violation and decay in social capital," Journal of Public Economics, Elsevier, vol. 137(C), pages 14-27.
    20. Yukun Zhao & Xiaobo Zhao & Zuo-Jun Max Shen, 2018. "The hot-versus-cold effect in a punishment game: a multi-round experimental study," Annals of Operations Research, Springer, vol. 268(1), pages 333-355, September.

    More about this item

    Keywords

    Reciprocity; Trust; Personality; Psychometrics; Revealed preferences;
    All these keywords.

    JEL classification:

    • C72 - Mathematical and Quantitative Methods - - Game Theory and Bargaining Theory - - - Noncooperative Games
    • C92 - Mathematical and Quantitative Methods - - Design of Experiments - - - Laboratory, Group Behavior
    • D03 - Microeconomics - - General - - - Behavioral Microeconomics: Underlying Principles

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:eee:soceco:v:84:y:2020:i:c:s2214804319301788. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Catherine Liu (email available below). General contact details of provider: http://www.elsevier.com/locate/inca/620175 .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.