IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/p/nan/wpaper/1303.html
   My bibliography  Save this paper

The Self-Image Signaling Roles of Voice in Decision-Making

Author

Listed:
  • Qiyan ONG

    (Division of Economics, Nanyang Technological University, Singapore 637332, Singapore)

  • Yohanes Eko RIYANTO

    (Division of Economics, Nanyang Technological University, Singapore 637332, Singapore)

  • Walter E. THESEIRA

    (Division of Economics, Nanyang Technological University, Singapore 637332, Singapore)

  • Steven M. SHEFFRIN

    (Murphy Institute, Department of Economics at Tulane University, 108 Tilton Hall, New Orleans, LA 70115)

Abstract

The desire to voice opinions has driven democracy movements and fueled the growth of social media. However, it is unclear why people value voice, and whether exercising voice affects subsequent behavior. Models of identity and self-inference posit that voice has value as a self-image signal: by speaking up, we demonstrate to ourselves that we possess desirable qualities. We investigate whether words can substitute for more costly actions that also self-signal desirable qualities – such as the act of rejecting an unfair offer in the ultimatum game. Our experiment modifies the ultimatum game to allow responders to bid to voice their opinions to a third party with no influence over the outcome of the game. We find that 63% of responders are willing to pay an average of 34% of their endowments for the opportunity for voice, even when their messages are not communicated to the proposer and have no strategic value. Crucially, expressing voice to a third party results in responders being willing to accept offers that are 15% lower. We find contrasting results – responders demand higher offers – in a comparison treatment where voice is communicated to the proposer. Our results suggest encouraging the expression of voice may ease acceptance of unpopular decisions, but only when people perceive their self-image will not be harmed.

Suggested Citation

  • Qiyan ONG & Yohanes Eko RIYANTO & Walter E. THESEIRA & Steven M. SHEFFRIN, 2013. "The Self-Image Signaling Roles of Voice in Decision-Making," Economic Growth Centre Working Paper Series 1303, Nanyang Technological University, School of Social Sciences, Economic Growth Centre.
    • Handle: RePEc:nan:wpaper:1303
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://www3.ntu.edu.sg/hss2/egc/wp/2013/2013-03.pdf
    Download Restriction: no
    ---><---

    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. Rabin, Matthew, 1994. "Cognitive dissonance and social change," Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, Elsevier, vol. 23(2), pages 177-194, March.
    3. Linda Babcock & George Loewenstein, 1997. "Explaining Bargaining Impasse: The Role of Self-Serving Biases," Journal of Economic Perspectives, American Economic Association, vol. 11(1), pages 109-126, Winter.
    4. Ben Greiner & Werner Güth & Ro’i Zultan, 2012. "Social communication and discrimination: a video experiment," Experimental Economics, Springer;Economic Science Association, vol. 15(3), pages 398-417, September.
    5. Dan Ariely & Anat Bracha & Stephan Meier, 2009. "Doing Good or Doing Well? Image Motivation and Monetary Incentives in Behaving Prosocially," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 99(1), pages 544-555, March.
    6. Turillo, Carmelo Joseph & Folger, Robert & Lavelle, James J. & Umphress, Elizabeth E. & Gee, Julie O., 2002. "Is virtue its own reward? Self-sacrificial decisions for the sake of fairness," Organizational Behavior and Human Decision Processes, Elsevier, vol. 89(1), pages 839-865, September.
    7. Carsten Schmidt & Ro'i Zultan, 2005. "The Uncontrolled Social Utility Hypothesis Revisited," Economics Bulletin, AccessEcon, vol. 3(33), pages 1-7.
    8. Akerlof, George A & Dickens, William T, 1982. "The Economic Consequences of Cognitive Dissonance," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 72(3), pages 307-319, June.
    9. Roland Bénabou & Jean Tirole, 2005. "Self-Confidence and Personal Motivation," International Economic Association Series, in: Bina Agarwal & Alessandro Vercelli (ed.), Psychology, Rationality and Economic Behaviour, chapter 2, pages 19-57, Palgrave Macmillan.
    10. Tirole, Jean, 2002. "Rational irrationality: Some economics of self-management," European Economic Review, Elsevier, vol. 46(4-5), pages 633-655, May.
    11. Hoffman, Elizabeth & McCabe, Kevin A & Smith, Vernon L, 1996. "On Expectations and the Monetary Stakes in Ultimatum Games," International Journal of Game Theory, Springer;Game Theory Society, vol. 25(3), pages 289-301.
    12. Qiyan Ong & Yohanes Riyanto & Steven Sheffrin, 2012. "How does voice matter? Evidence from the ultimatum game," Experimental Economics, Springer;Economic Science Association, vol. 15(4), pages 604-621, December.
    13. Joseph Farrell & Matthew Rabin, 1996. "Cheap Talk," Journal of Economic Perspectives, American Economic Association, vol. 10(3), pages 103-118, Summer.
    14. Grossman, Zachary, 2010. "Self-Signaling Versus Social-Signaling in Giving," University of California at Santa Barbara, Economics Working Paper Series qt7320x2cp, Department of Economics, UC Santa Barbara.
    15. Croson, Rachel & Boles, Terry & Murnighan, J. Keith, 2003. "Cheap talk in bargaining experiments: lying and threats in ultimatum games," Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, Elsevier, vol. 51(2), pages 143-159, June.
    16. Cameron, Lisa A, 1999. "Raising the Stakes in the Ultimatum Game: Experimental Evidence from Indonesia," Economic Inquiry, Western Economic Association International, vol. 37(1), pages 47-59, January.
    17. George Loewenstein & Don A. Moore, 2004. "When Ignorance Is Bliss: Information Exchange and Inefficiency in Bargaining," The Journal of Legal Studies, University of Chicago Press, vol. 33(1), pages 37-58, January.
    18. Erte Xiao & Daniel Houser, 2005. "Emotion expression in human punishment behavior," Experimental 0504003, University Library of Munich, Germany, revised 18 May 2005.
    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. Pascal Langenbach, 2014. "The values of ex-ante and ex-post communication in dictator games," Discussion Paper Series of the Max Planck Institute for Research on Collective Goods 2014_07, Max Planck Institute for Research on Collective Goods, revised Apr 2016.
    2. Samahita, Margaret, 2017. "Venting and gossiping in conflicts: Verbal expression in ultimatum games," Journal of Behavioral and Experimental Economics (formerly The Journal of Socio-Economics), Elsevier, vol. 67(C), pages 111-121.
    3. Kleine, Marco & Langenbach, Pascal & Zhurakhovska, Lilia, 2017. "How voice shapes reactions to impartial decision-makers: An experiment on participation procedures," Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, Elsevier, vol. 143(C), pages 241-253.

    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. Jingnan Chen & Daniel Houser, 2017. "Promises and lies: can observers detect deception in written messages," Experimental Economics, Springer;Economic Science Association, vol. 20(2), pages 396-419, June.
    2. Güth, Werner & Kocher, Martin G., 2014. "More than thirty years of ultimatum bargaining experiments: Motives, variations, and a survey of the recent literature," Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, Elsevier, vol. 108(C), pages 396-409.
    3. Aina, Chiara & Battigalli, Pierpaolo & Gamba, Astrid, 2020. "Frustration and anger in the Ultimatum Game: An experiment," Games and Economic Behavior, Elsevier, vol. 122(C), pages 150-167.
    4. Zultan, Ro’i, 2012. "Strategic and social pre-play communication in the ultimatum game," Journal of Economic Psychology, Elsevier, vol. 33(3), pages 425-434.
    5. Rustichini, Aldo & Villeval, Marie Claire, 2014. "Moral hypocrisy, power and social preferences," Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, Elsevier, vol. 107(PA), pages 10-24.
    6. Samahita, Margaret, 2017. "Venting and gossiping in conflicts: Verbal expression in ultimatum games," Journal of Behavioral and Experimental Economics (formerly The Journal of Socio-Economics), Elsevier, vol. 67(C), pages 111-121.
    7. Kleine, Marco & Langenbach, Pascal & Zhurakhovska, Lilia, 2017. "How voice shapes reactions to impartial decision-makers: An experiment on participation procedures," Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, Elsevier, vol. 143(C), pages 241-253.
    8. Houser, Daniel & Xiao, Erte & McCabe, Kevin & Smith, Vernon, 2008. "When punishment fails: Research on sanctions, intentions and non-cooperation," Games and Economic Behavior, Elsevier, vol. 62(2), pages 509-532, March.
    9. Schnellenbach, Jan & Schubert, Christian, 2015. "Behavioral political economy: A survey," European Journal of Political Economy, Elsevier, vol. 40(PB), pages 395-417.
    10. Nyborg, Karine, 2011. "I don't want to hear about it: Rational ignorance among duty-oriented consumers," Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, Elsevier, vol. 79(3), pages 263-274, August.
    11. Mitesh Kataria & Tobias Regner, 2015. "Honestly, why are you donating money to charity? An experimental study about self-awareness in status-seeking behavior," Theory and Decision, Springer, vol. 79(3), pages 493-515, November.
    12. Declerck, Carolyn H. & Kiyonari, Toko & Boone, Christophe, 2009. "Why do responders reject unequal offers in the Ultimatum Game? An experimental study on the role of perceiving interdependence," Journal of Economic Psychology, Elsevier, vol. 30(3), pages 335-343, June.
    13. Rebitzer, James B. & Taylor, Lowell J., 2011. "Extrinsic Rewards and Intrinsic Motives: Standard and Behavioral Approaches to Agency and Labor Markets," Handbook of Labor Economics, in: O. Ashenfelter & D. Card (ed.), Handbook of Labor Economics, edition 1, volume 4, chapter 8, pages 701-772, Elsevier.
    14. Macera, Rosario, 2014. "Dynamic beliefs," Games and Economic Behavior, Elsevier, vol. 87(C), pages 1-18.
    15. Zachary Grossman, 2014. "Strategic Ignorance and the Robustness of Social Preferences," Management Science, INFORMS, vol. 60(11), pages 2659-2665, November.
    16. Ahrens, Steffen & Bosch-Rosa, Ciril, 2023. "Motivated beliefs, social preferences, and limited liability in financial decision-Making," Journal of Banking & Finance, Elsevier, vol. 154(C).
    17. Johansson-Stenman, Olof & Martinsson, Peter, 2006. "Honestly, why are you driving a BMW?," Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, Elsevier, vol. 60(2), pages 129-146, June.
    18. Ockenfels, Axel & Werner, Peter, 2012. "‘Hiding behind a small cake’ in a newspaper dictator game," Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, Elsevier, vol. 82(1), pages 82-85.
    19. Klempt Charlotte & Pull Kerstin & Stadler Manfred, 2019. "Asymmetric Information in Simple Bargaining Games: An Experimental Study," German Economic Review, De Gruyter, vol. 20(1), pages 29-51, February.
    20. Kang, Seongill, 2022. "The interactive dynamics of autonomous and heteronomous motives," Mathematical Social Sciences, Elsevier, vol. 115(C), pages 11-26.

    More about this item

    Keywords

    voice; self-image; identity; self-signal; ultimatum game;
    All these keywords.

    JEL classification:

    • D03 - Microeconomics - - General - - - Behavioral Microeconomics: Underlying Principles
    • D63 - Microeconomics - - Welfare Economics - - - Equity, Justice, Inequality, and Other Normative Criteria and Measurement
    • C91 - Mathematical and Quantitative Methods - - Design of Experiments - - - Laboratory, Individual Behavior

    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:nan:wpaper:1303. 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: Magdalene Lim (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://edirc.repec.org/data/dentusg.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.