Moral Costs and Rational Choice: Theory and Experimental Evidence

James Cox, John List, Michael Price, Vjollca Sadiraj and Anya Samek

No 2016-02, Experimental Economics Center Working Paper Series from Experimental Economics Center, Andrew Young School of Policy Studies, Georgia State University

Abstract: The literature exploring other regarding behavior sheds important light on interesting social phenomena, yet less attention has been given to how the received results speak to foundational assumptions within economics. Our study synthesizes the empirical evidence, showing that recent work challenges convex preference theory but is largely consistent with rational choice theory. Guided by this understanding, we design a new, more demanding test of a central tenet of economics-the contraction axiom-within a sharing framework. Making use of more than 325 dictators participating in a series of allocation games, we show that sharing choices violate the contraction axiom. We advance a new theory that augments standard models with moral reference points to explain our experimental data. Our theory also organizes the broader sharing patterns in the received literature.

Keywords: experiment; giving; taking; altruism; moral cost (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: C93 D03 D64 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Pages: 48
Date: 2016-05, Revised 2025-02
New Economics Papers: this item is included in nep-cbe, nep-exp, nep-hpe and nep-upt
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Citations: View citations in EconPapers (1)

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http://excen.gsu.edu/workingpapers/GSU_EXCEN_WP_2016-02.pdf First version, 2016 (application/pdf)
http://excen.gsu.edu/workingpapers/GSU_EXCEN_WP_2017-07.pdf Revised version, 2017 (application/pdf)
http://excen.gsu.edu/workingpapers/GSU_EXCEN_WP_2018-05.pdf Revised version, 2018 (application/pdf)
http://excen.gsu.edu/workingpapers/GSU_EXCEN_WP_2019-02.pdf Revised version, 2019 (application/pdf)
http://excen.gsu.edu/workingpapers/GSU_EXCEN_WP_2025-01.pdf Revised version, 2025 (application/pdf)

Related works:
Working Paper: Moral Costs and Rational Choice: Theory and Experimental Evidence (2016)
Working Paper: Moral Costs and Rational Choice: Theory and Experimental Evidence (2016)
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Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:exc:wpaper:2016-02

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