Does room for reflection reduce ignorance and increase pro-social behavior? An experimental study

Fabian Bopp () and Wendelin Schnedler
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Fabian Bopp: Paderborn University

No 109, Working Papers Dissertations from Paderborn University, Faculty of Business Administration and Economics

Abstract: A lot of harm comes about because people ignore the consequences of their behavior on others. Experimental evidence suggests that people might even willfully ignore consequences so that they can act selfishly without a `bad conscience'. In essence, such people `kid themselves'. If I care about the consequences of my acts on others, I should not ignore them. Upon reflection, people may discover this inconsistency. De-biasing people may thus be an effective tool to prevent harm. We examine this idea experimentally. Ee find that inviting subjects to describe their aims and means makes them more likely to inform themselves and ultimately act more pro-socially.

Keywords: willful ignorance; strategic ignorance; social preferences; de-biasing (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: C91 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Pages: 34
Date: 2023-04
New Economics Papers: this item is included in nep-cbe and nep-exp
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