IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/p/jau/wpaper/2023-05.html
   My bibliography  Save this paper

Watching the embezzler: an experiment on antisocial behaviour

Author

Listed:
  • Anabel Doñate-Buendía

    (LEE and Department of Economics, Universitat Jaume I, Castellón, Spain)

  • Aurora García-Gallego

Abstract

Embezzlement is a type of antisocial behaviour that occurs in our daily life. In this study, the importance of watching eyes for reducing this type of antisocial behaviour is examined. The embezzlement game is implemented, focusing on the decision of an intermediary, who gets an amount of money donated by some people to an NGO and decides on how much to give to the beneficiaries of that money. Here we propose that implementing watching eyes can effectively reduce embezzlement. The variable sex is also considered, analysing the sex of the subject and the interaction between the sex of the decision maker and the sex of the eyes. A laboratory experiment with four treatments and a baseline is run, controlling for who is watching you (woman vs. man), and how realistic it feels (static image vs. GIF). Gender differences on embezzlement decisions are significant. Furthermore, significant differences are found regarding the realism of the tool of watching eyes and the sex of it. Therefore, it is relevant the type of tool used in order to reduce antisocial behaviour, as well as the sex of that tool (eyes in this case). Also the sex and other individual characteristics of the sample population matter. All these variables should be considered when defining an intervention in order to accurately reduce antisocial behaviour.

Suggested Citation

  • Anabel Doñate-Buendía & Aurora García-Gallego, 2023. "Watching the embezzler: an experiment on antisocial behaviour," Working Papers 2023/05, Economics Department, Universitat Jaume I, Castellón (Spain).
    • Handle: RePEc:jau:wpaper:2023/05
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://www.doctreballeco.uji.es/wpficheros/Donate_Garcia_05_2023.pdf
    Download Restriction: no
    ---><---

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Sabater-Grande, Gerardo & Georgantzis, Nikolaos, 2002. "Accounting for risk aversion in repeated prisoners' dilemma games: an experimental test," Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, Elsevier, vol. 48(1), pages 37-50, May.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    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. Brañas-Garza, Pablo & Georgantzís, Nikolaos & Guillen, Pablo, 2007. "Direct and indirect effects of pathological gambling on risk attitudes," Judgment and Decision Making, Cambridge University Press, vol. 2(2), pages 126-136, April.
      • Pablo Brañas-Garza & Nikolaos Georgantzis & Pablo Guillen, 2005. "I do not play lotteries," ThE Papers 05/04, Department of Economic Theory and Economic History of the University of Granada..
    2. Gary Charness & Marie-Claire Villeval, 2009. "Cooperation and Competition in Intergenerational Experiments in the Field and the Laboratory," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 99(3), pages 956-978, June.
    3. repec:cup:judgdm:v:14:y:2019:i:3:p:234-279 is not listed on IDEAS
    4. Cheng, Long & McDonald, Stuart & Ye, Guangliang, 2023. "Cartelization under present bias and imperfect public signals," Mathematical Social Sciences, Elsevier, vol. 123(C), pages 77-86.
    5. Mario A. Maggioni & Domenico Rossignoli, 2021. "If it Looks like a Human and Speaks like a Human..," DISEIS - Quaderni del Dipartimento di Economia internazionale, delle istituzioni e dello sviluppo dis2101, Università Cattolica del Sacro Cuore, Dipartimento di Economia internazionale, delle istituzioni e dello sviluppo (DISEIS).
    6. Al-Ubaydli, Omar & Jones, Garett & Weel, Jaap, 2016. "Average player traits as predictors of cooperation in a repeated prisoner's dilemma," Journal of Behavioral and Experimental Economics (formerly The Journal of Socio-Economics), Elsevier, vol. 64(C), pages 50-60.
    7. Mario A. Maggioni & Domenico Rossignoli, 2021. "If it Looks like a Human and Speaks like a Human ... Dialogue and cooperation in human-robot interactions," Papers 2104.11652, arXiv.org, revised May 2021.
    8. Jansen, Anika & Pfeifer, Harald & Raecke, Julia, 2017. "Only the brave? Risk and time preferences of decision makers and firms’ investment in worker training," Research Memorandum 004, Maastricht University, Graduate School of Business and Economics (GSBE).
    9. Tamás Csermely & Alexander Rabas, 2016. "How to reveal people’s preferences: Comparing time consistency and predictive power of multiple price list risk elicitation methods," Journal of Risk and Uncertainty, Springer, vol. 53(2), pages 107-136, December.
    10. Giuseppe Attanasi & Nikolaos Georgantzís & Valentina Rotondi & Daria Vigani, 2018. "Lottery- and survey-based risk attitudes linked through a multichoice elicitation task," Theory and Decision, Springer, vol. 84(3), pages 341-372, May.
    11. Giuseppe Attanasi & Kene Boun My & Nikolaos Georgantzís & Miguel Ginés, 2019. "Strategic Ethics: Altruism without the Other-Regarding Confound," Revue économique, Presses de Sciences-Po, vol. 70(6), pages 967-998.
    12. Brañas-Garza, Pablo & Guillen, Pablo & del Paso, Rafael López, 2008. "Math skills and risk attitudes," Economics Letters, Elsevier, vol. 99(2), pages 332-336, May.
    13. Fabien Perez & Guillaume Hollard & Radu Vranceanu, 2021. "How serious is the measurement-error problem in risk-aversion tasks?," Journal of Risk and Uncertainty, Springer, vol. 63(3), pages 319-342, December.
    14. Aurora García-Gallego & Nikolaos Georgantzís & Ainhoa Jaramillo-Gutiérrez & Melanie Parravano, 2010. "The lottery-panel task for bi-dimensional parameter-free elicitation of risk attitudes," ThE Papers 10/12, Department of Economic Theory and Economic History of the University of Granada..
    15. repec:cup:judgdm:v:2:y:2007:i::p:126-136 is not listed on IDEAS
    16. Carsten J. Crede & Liang Lu, 2016. "The effects of endogenous enforcement on strategic uncertainty and cartel deterrence," Working Paper series, University of East Anglia, Centre for Behavioural and Experimental Social Science (CBESS) 16-08, School of Economics, University of East Anglia, Norwich, UK..
    17. Annarita Colasante & Aurora García-Gallego & Andrea Morone & Tiziana Temerario, 2017. "The utopia of cooperation: does intra-group competition drive out free riding?," Working Papers 2017/08, Economics Department, Universitat Jaume I, Castellón (Spain).
    18. García-Gallego, Aurora & Georgantzís, Nikolaos & Jaramillo-Gutiérrez, Ainhoa, 2012. "Gender differences in ultimatum games: Despite rather than due to risk attitudes," Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, Elsevier, vol. 83(1), pages 42-49.
    19. Marie-Laure Cabon-Dhersin & Nathalie Etchart-Vincent, 2012. "The puzzle of cooperation in a game of chicken: an experimental study," Theory and Decision, Springer, vol. 72(1), pages 65-87, January.
    20. Guillaume R. Fréchette & Sevgi Yuksel, 2017. "Infinitely repeated games in the laboratory: four perspectives on discounting and random termination," Experimental Economics, Springer;Economic Science Association, vol. 20(2), pages 279-308, June.
    21. Lisa Anderson & Beth Freeborn & Jason Hulbert, 2012. "Risk Aversion and Tacit Collusion in a Bertrand Duopoly Experiment," Review of Industrial Organization, Springer;The Industrial Organization Society, vol. 40(1), pages 37-50, February.
    22. Barreda-Tarrazona, Iván & García-Gallego, Aurora & Georgantzís, Nikolaos & Ziros, Nicholas, 2018. "Market games as social dilemmas," Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, Elsevier, vol. 155(C), pages 435-444.

    More about this item

    Keywords

    embezzlement game; experiment; gender; visual cues; antisocial behaviour;
    All these keywords.

    JEL classification:

    • C91 - Mathematical and Quantitative Methods - - Design of Experiments - - - Laboratory, Individual Behavior
    • D63 - Microeconomics - - Welfare Economics - - - Equity, Justice, Inequality, and Other Normative Criteria and Measurement
    • D64 - Microeconomics - - Welfare Economics - - - Altruism; Philanthropy; Intergenerational Transfers
    • D91 - Microeconomics - - Micro-Based Behavioral Economics - - - Role and Effects of Psychological, Emotional, Social, and Cognitive Factors on Decision Making
    • J16 - Labor and Demographic Economics - - Demographic Economics - - - Economics of Gender; Non-labor Discrimination

    NEP fields

    This paper has been announced in the following NEP Reports:

    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:jau:wpaper:2023/05. 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: María Aurora Garcia Gallego (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://edirc.repec.org/data/ueujies.html .

    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.