Social comparison nudges—Guessing the norm increases charitable giving

Simon Bartke, Andreas Friedl, Felix Gelhaar and Laura Reh

Economics Letters, 2017, vol. 152, issue C, 73-75

Abstract: Social comparison nudges that employ descriptive norms were found to increase charitable giving. This paper finds that individuals who receive a descriptive norm donate significantly more when they have to guess the descriptive norm beforehand. We argue that guessing draws attention to the norm and therefore increases its effectiveness. Our results suggest that the effectiveness of nudges that use descriptive norms depends on how the a priori beliefs about the descriptive norm are updated.

Keywords: Social comparison nudge; Attention; Field experiment; Charitable giving; Social norms (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: C93 D03 D64 H4 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2017
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (20)

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Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:eee:ecolet:v:152:y:2017:i:c:p:73-75

DOI: 10.1016/j.econlet.2016.12.023

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