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

Right in the Middle: A Field Experiment On The Role Of Integrity Training And Norms In Combating Corruption

Author

Listed:
  • Oana Borcan

    (School of Economics, University of East Anglia)

  • Nikita Grabher-Meyer

    (School of Economics, University of East Anglia)

  • Stephanie Heger

    (University of Bologna)

  • Amrish Patel

    (School of Economics, University of East Anglia)

Abstract

Although integrity education and awareness is touted as an important solution to combat corruption, there is little evidence on its effectiveness. To fill this gap, we conduct a lab-in-the-field experiment where law students in Ukraine are randomly assigned to an innovative and interactive integrity training programme to enhance students awareness and behaviour around ethical issues. We collect data on attitudes towards corruption and actual corrupt behaviour through a series of surveys and a novel experimental game, in which both the integrity-trained students and those who did not get assigned to integrity training play the role of middlemen in a bribe exchange between firms and public officials. We show that integrity training had a significant impact on attitudes towards corruption but only significantly reduced corrupt behaviour in the game when the students knew they were playing alongside other integrity-trained students.

Suggested Citation

  • Oana Borcan & Nikita Grabher-Meyer & Stephanie Heger & Amrish Patel, 2023. "Right in the Middle: A Field Experiment On The Role Of Integrity Training And Norms In Combating Corruption," University of East Anglia School of Economics Working Paper Series 2023-05, School of Economics, University of East Anglia, Norwich, UK..
    • Handle: RePEc:uea:ueaeco:2023-05
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://ueaeco.github.io/working-papers/papers/ueaeco/UEA-ECO-2023-05.pdf
    File Function: main text
    Download Restriction: no
    ---><---

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. David Desplaces & David Melchar & Laura Beauvais & Susan Bosco, 2007. "The Impact of Business Education on Moral Judgment Competence: An Empirical Study," Journal of Business Ethics, Springer, vol. 74(1), pages 73-87, August.
    2. Banerjee, Ritwik & Mitra, Arnab, 2018. "On monetary and non-monetary interventions to combat corruption," Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, Elsevier, vol. 149(C), pages 332-355.
    3. Klaus Abbink & Heike Hennig-Schmidt, 2006. "Neutral versus loaded instructions in a bribery experiment," Experimental Economics, Springer;Economic Science Association, vol. 9(2), pages 103-121, June.
    4. Barr, Abigail & Serra, Danila, 2010. "Corruption and culture: An experimental analysis," Journal of Public Economics, Elsevier, vol. 94(11-12), pages 862-869, December.
    5. Danila Serra, 2012. "Combining Top-Down and Bottom-Up Accountability: Evidence from a Bribery Experiment," The Journal of Law, Economics, and Organization, Oxford University Press, vol. 28(3), pages 569-587, August.
    6. Benjamin Enke, 2020. "Moral Values and Voting," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 128(10), pages 3679-3729.
    7. Klaus Abbink & Esteban Freidin & Lata Gangadharan & Rodrigo Moro, 2018. "The Effect of Social Norms on Bribe Offers," The Journal of Law, Economics, and Organization, Oxford University Press, vol. 34(3), pages 457-474.
    8. Klaus Abbink & Bernd Irlenbusch & Elke Renner, 2002. "An Experimental Bribery Game," The Journal of Law, Economics, and Organization, Oxford University Press, vol. 18(2), pages 428-454, October.
    9. Güzin Bayar, 2005. "The role of intermediaries in corruption," Public Choice, Springer, vol. 122(3), pages 277-298, March.
    10. George A. Akerlof, 1980. "A Theory of Social Custom, of which Unemployment may be One Consequence," The Quarterly Journal of Economics, President and Fellows of Harvard College, vol. 94(4), pages 749-775.
    11. Jonathan de Quidt & Johannes Haushofer & Christopher Roth, 2018. "Measuring and Bounding Experimenter Demand," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 108(11), pages 3266-3302, November.
    12. Mr. George T. Abed & Mr. Hamid R Davoodi, 2000. "Corruption, Structural Reforms, and Economic Performance in the Transition Economies," IMF Working Papers 2000/132, International Monetary Fund.
    13. Johann Graf Lambsdorff, 2013. "Corrupt intermediaries in international business transactions: between make, buy and reform," European Journal of Law and Economics, Springer, vol. 35(3), pages 349-366, June.
    14. Mikhail Drugov & John Hamman & Danila Serra, 2014. "Intermediaries in corruption: an experiment," Experimental Economics, Springer;Economic Science Association, vol. 17(1), pages 78-99, March.
    15. Brian Mayhew & Pamela Murphy, 2009. "The Impact of Ethics Education on Reporting Behavior," Journal of Business Ethics, Springer, vol. 86(3), pages 397-416, May.
    16. Ritwik Banerjee, 2016. "On the interpretation of bribery in a laboratory corruption game: moral frames and social norms," Experimental Economics, Springer;Economic Science Association, vol. 19(1), pages 240-267, March.
    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. Harris, Donna & Borcan , Oana & Serra, Danila & Telli, Henry & Schettini, Bruno & Dercon, Stefan, 2024. "Proud to Belong: The Impact of Ethics Training on Police Officers in Ghana," CEPR Discussion Papers 19141, C.E.P.R. Discussion Papers.

    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. Levati, M. Vittoria & Nardi, Chiara, 2023. "Letting third parties who suffer from petty corruption talk: Evidence from a collusive bribery experiment," European Journal of Political Economy, Elsevier, vol. 76(C).
    2. Maria Vittoria Levati & Chiara Nardi, 2019. "The power of words in a petty corruption experiment," Working Papers 18/2019, University of Verona, Department of Economics.
    3. Christoph Engel, 2016. "Experimental Criminal Law. A Survey of Contributions from Law, Economics and Criminology," Discussion Paper Series of the Max Planck Institute for Research on Collective Goods 2016_07, Max Planck Institute for Research on Collective Goods.
    4. Ryvkin, Dmitry & Serra, Danila, 2020. "Corruption and competition among bureaucrats: An experimental study," Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, Elsevier, vol. 175(C), pages 439-451.
    5. van Veldhuizen, R., 2013. "The influence of wages on public officials’ corruptibility: A laboratory investigation," Journal of Economic Psychology, Elsevier, vol. 39(C), pages 341-356.
    6. Shuguang Jiang & Marie Claire Villeval, 2022. "Dishonesty in Developing Countries -What Can We Learn From Experiments?," Working Papers hal-03899654, HAL.
    7. Dmitry Ryvkin & Danila Serra, 2016. "The Industrial Organization of Corruption: Monopoly, Competition and Collusion," Working Papers wp2016_10_01, Department of Economics, Florida State University.
    8. Thomas Giel & Sören Dallmeyer & Daniel Memmert & Christoph Breuer, 2023. "Corruption and Self-Sabotage in Sporting Competitions – An Experimental Approach to Match-Fixing Behavior and the Influence of Deterrence Factors," Journal of Sports Economics, , vol. 24(4), pages 497-525, May.
    9. Hans J. Czap & Natalia V. Czap, 2019. "‘I Gave You More’: Discretionary Power in a Corruption Experiment," Journal of Interdisciplinary Economics, , vol. 32(2), pages 200-217, July.
    10. Salmon, Timothy C. & Serra, Danila, 2017. "Corruption, social judgment and culture: An experiment," Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, Elsevier, vol. 142(C), pages 64-78.
    11. Jiang, Shuguang & Wei, Qian, 2022. "Confucian culture, moral reminder, and soft corruption," Journal of Behavioral and Experimental Economics (formerly The Journal of Socio-Economics), Elsevier, vol. 98(C).
    12. Jin Zheng & Arthur Schram & Gönül Doğan, 2021. "Friend or foe? Social ties in bribery and corruption," Experimental Economics, Springer;Economic Science Association, vol. 24(3), pages 854-882, September.
    13. He, Haoran & Jiang, Shuguang, 2020. "Partisan culture, identity and corruption: An experiment based on the Chinese Communist Party," China Economic Review, Elsevier, vol. 60(C).
    14. Murray, Cameron K. & Frijters, Paul & Vorster, Melissa, 2017. "The back-scratching game," Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, Elsevier, vol. 142(C), pages 494-508.
    15. Engel, Christoph & Zamir, Eyal, 2024. "Is transparency a blessing or a curse? An experimental horse race between accountability and extortionary corruption," International Review of Law and Economics, Elsevier, vol. 78(C).
    16. Boly, Amadou & Gillanders, Robert, 2018. "Anti-corruption policy making, discretionary power and institutional quality: An experimental analysis," Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, Elsevier, vol. 152(C), pages 314-327.
    17. Alice Guerra & Tatyana Zhuravleva, 2022. "Do women always behave as corruption cleaners?," Public Choice, Springer, vol. 191(1), pages 173-192, April.
    18. Saucedo Cepeda, Abraham, 2024. "An experimental study of auctioneers’ and bidders’ preferences over corruption in auctions," Journal of Behavioral and Experimental Economics (formerly The Journal of Socio-Economics), Elsevier, vol. 108(C).
    19. Mikhail Drugov & John Hamman & Danila Serra, 2014. "Intermediaries in corruption: an experiment," Experimental Economics, Springer;Economic Science Association, vol. 17(1), pages 78-99, March.

    More about this item

    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:uea:ueaeco: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: Cara Liggins (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://edirc.repec.org/data/esueauk.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.