Punishment with Uncertain Outcomes in the Prisoner’s Dilemma

Peter Duersch and Maroš Servátka ()
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Maroš Servátka: University of Canterbury, https://www.canterbury.ac.nz
Authors registered in the RePEc Author Service: Peter Dürsch

Working Papers in Economics from University of Canterbury, Department of Economics and Finance

Abstract: This paper experimentally investigates whether risk-averse individuals punish less if the outcome of punishment is uncertain than when it is certain. Our design includes three treatments: Baseline in which the one-shot prisoner’s dilemma game is played; Certain Punishment in which the prisoner’s dilemma game is followed by a punishment stage allowing subjects to decrease the other player’s payoff by 2 Euros; and Uncertain Punishment in which subjects could decrease the other player’s payoff with a 50% probability by 1 Euro and with a 50% probability by 3 Euros. We find that in all cases the risk-averse subjects are equally likely to cooperate in the prisoner’s dilemma and equally likely to punish in the second stage in either of the two punishment treatments.

Keywords: Experimental economics; prisoner’s dilemma; punishment; risk aversion; uncertainty (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: C70 C91 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Pages: 26 pages
Date: 2009-07-25
New Economics Papers: this item is included in nep-cbe, nep-exp, nep-gth, nep-hpe and nep-upt
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (1)

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Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:cbt:econwp:09/12

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