Lying with heterogeneous image concerns

Alexei Zakharov

Economics Letters, 2023, vol. 228, issue C

Abstract: We study reporting in a lying game where the agents differ in two characteristics: the intrinsic cost of lying, and the social cost due to one’s report being perceived as a lie. We show that making lying more socially costly can lead to making lying more frequent. This happens because increasing the social cost for a subset of agents will make them choose high-value reports less frequently, making such reports less socially costly for the rest of the agents, and inviting them to lie more.

Keywords: Lying; Incentives; Social image (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2023
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Citations: View citations in EconPapers (1)

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Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:eee:ecolet:v:228:y:2023:i:c:s0165176523002021

DOI: 10.1016/j.econlet.2023.111177

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