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Affect and Fairness

Author

Listed:
  • Jonathan Schulz
  • Urs Fischbacher
  • Christian Thöni
  • Verena Utikal

Abstract

We investigate the role of affect and deliberation on social preferences. In our laboratory experiment subjects decide on a series of mini Dictator games while they are under varying degrees of cognitive load. The cognitive load is intended to decrease deliberation and therefore enhance the influence of affect on behavior. In each game subjects have two options: they can decide between a fair or an unfair allocation. We find that subjects in a high-load condition are more generous - they more often choose the fair allocation than subjects in a low-load condition. The series of mini Dictator games also allows us to investigate how subjects react to the games� varying levels of advantageous inequality. Low-load subjects react considerably more to the degree of advantageous inequality. Our results therefore underscore the importance of affect for basic altruistic behavior and deliberation in adjusting decisions to a given situation.

Suggested Citation

  • Jonathan Schulz & Urs Fischbacher & Christian Thöni & Verena Utikal, 2011. "Affect and Fairness," TWI Research Paper Series 68, Thurgauer Wirtschaftsinstitut, Universität Konstanz.
    • Handle: RePEc:twi:respas:0068
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    6. Tim Friehe & Hannah Schildberg-Hörisch, 2014. "Crime and Self-Control Revisited: Disentangling the Effect of Self-Control on Risk and Social Preferences," CESifo Working Paper Series 4747, CESifo.
    7. Tim Friehe & Mario Mechtel & Markus Pannenberg, 2014. "Positional Income Concerns: Prevalence and Relationship with Personality and Economic Preferences," IAAEU Discussion Papers 201411, Institute of Labour Law and Industrial Relations in the European Union (IAAEU).
    8. Hanna Fromell & Daniele Nosenzo & Trudy Owens, 2014. "Tradeoffs between Self-interest and Other-Regarding Preferences Cause Willpower Depletion," Discussion Papers 2014-14, The Centre for Decision Research and Experimental Economics, School of Economics, University of Nottingham.
    9. Jonathan Schulz & Petra Thiemann & Christian Thoeni, 2015. "Defaults in charitable giving," Discussion Papers 2015-06, The Centre for Decision Research and Experimental Economics, School of Economics, University of Nottingham.
    10. Duffy, Sean & Smith, John, 2014. "Cognitive load in the multi-player prisoner's dilemma game: Are there brains in games?," Journal of Behavioral and Experimental Economics (formerly The Journal of Socio-Economics), Elsevier, vol. 51(C), pages 47-56.
    11. Chen, Chia-Ching & Chiu, I-Ming & Smith, John & Yamada, Tetsuji, 2013. "Too smart to be selfish? Measures of cognitive ability, social preferences, and consistency," Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, Elsevier, vol. 90(C), pages 112-122.
    12. Anna Dreber & Drew Fudenberg & David K Levine & David G Rand, 2014. "Altruism and Self Control," Levine's Working Paper Archive 786969000000000962, David K. Levine.
    13. Allred, Sarah & Duffy, Sean & Smith, John, 2016. "Cognitive load and strategic sophistication," Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, Elsevier, vol. 125(C), pages 162-178.
    14. Francesco Guala & Antonio Filippin, 2017. "The Effect of Group Identity on Distributive Choice: Social Preference or Heuristic?," Economic Journal, Royal Economic Society, vol. 127(602), pages 1047-1068, June.
    15. Karen Evelyn Hauge & Kjell Arne Brekke & Lars-Olof Johansson & Olof Johansson-Stenman & Henrik Svedsäter, 2016. "Keeping others in our mind or in our heart? Distribution games under cognitive load," Experimental Economics, Springer;Economic Science Association, vol. 19(3), pages 562-576, September.
    16. Kristian Ove R. Myrseth & Gerhard Riener & Conny Wollbrant, 2013. "Tangible temptation in the social dilemma: Cash, cooperation, and self-control," ESMT Research Working Papers ESMT-13-04, ESMT European School of Management and Technology.
    17. Kessler, Judd B. & Meier, Stephan, 2014. "Learning from (failed) replications: Cognitive load manipulations and charitable giving," Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, Elsevier, vol. 102(C), pages 10-13.
    18. Engel, Christoph & Rand, David G., 2014. "What does “clean” really mean? The implicit framing of decontextualized experiments," Economics Letters, Elsevier, vol. 122(3), pages 386-389.
    19. Grossman, Zachary & van der Weele, Joël & Andrijevik, Ana, 2014. "A Test of Dual-Process Reasoning in Charitable Giving," University of California at Santa Barbara, Economics Working Paper Series qt4tm617f7, Department of Economics, UC Santa Barbara.

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