Lying, spying, sabotaging: Procedures and consequences

Nadine Chlaß and Gerhard Riener

No 196, DICE Discussion Papers from Heinrich Heine University Düsseldorf, Düsseldorf Institute for Competition Economics (DICE)

Abstract: We study individuals who can choose how to compete with an opponent for one nonzero payoff. They can either nudge themselves into a fair set of rules where they have the same information and actions as their opponent, or into unfair rules where they spy, sabotage or fabricate their opponent's action. In an experiment, we observe significant altruism under rules which allow for fabrication and sabotage, but not under rules which allow for spying. We provide direct evidence that this altruism emanates from an ethical concern about the rules of the game. How individuals deal with this concern - whether they nudge themselves into fabrication-free, spying-free, or sabotage-free rules, or whether they assume the power to fabricate or sabotage to compensate their opponent by giving all payoff away - varies along with individuals' attitudes towards power.

Keywords: moral judgement; psychological games; institutional design; lying aversion; sabotage aversion; spying aversion; unfair competition (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: D02 D03 D63 D64 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2015
New Economics Papers: this item is included in nep-cbe and nep-exp
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (4)

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Related works:
Working Paper: Lying, Spying, Sabotaging: Procedures and Consequences (2015)
Working Paper: Lying, spying, sabotaging: procedures and consequences (2015)
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Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:zbw:dicedp:196

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