What does “clean” really mean? The implicit framing of decontextualized experiments

Christoph Engel and David G. Rand

Economics Letters, 2014, vol. 122, issue 3, 386-389

Abstract: It is standard in experimental economics to use decontextualized designs where payoff structures are presented using neutral language. Here we show that cooperation in such a neutrally framed Prisoner’s Dilemma is equivalent to a PD framed as contributing to a cooperative endeavour. Conversely, there is substantially less cooperation in a PD framed as a competition. We conclude that in a decontextualized context, our participants by default project a cooperative frame onto the payoff structure.

Keywords: Cooperation; Framing; Social dilemmas; Social preferences (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: C70 C91 D62 D64 D80 H41 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2014
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (31)

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Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:eee:ecolet:v:122:y:2014:i:3:p:386-389

DOI: 10.1016/j.econlet.2013.12.020

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