 Non-isolation, reversals, and social preferencePaul H.Y. Cheung and Keaton Ellis Games and Economic Behavior, 2025, vol. 154, issue C, 159-174 Abstract: Recent evidence suggests that non-isolation behavior could significantly impact laboratory experiments using the random problem selection (RPS) payment mechanism through lottery integration. Theoretical work also highlights social preferences that can violate statewise monotonicity, a necessary and sufficient condition for incentive compatibility with the RPS payment mechanism in case of lottery integration. Additionally, non-isolation can influence decisions through non-consequential dynamic concerns. In a series of three simple and parsimonious experiments and three tests, we examine the occurrence of the two kinds of non-isolation and reversal behaviors. We find significant evidence for positive reversal behavior, where subjects are more likely to make a fair choice if there is an alternative possible realization of an unfair outcome (which they chose themselves). In addition, the lower bounds for the prevalence of non-isolation in terms of lottery integration and dynamic non-consequential concern are estimated to be approximately 10% and 20%, respectively. Keywords: Non-isolation; Social preference; Payment mechanism; Experimental methodology; Decisions under risk (search for similar items in EconPapers) Downloads: (external link) Related works: Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:eee:gamebe:v:154:y:2025:i:c:p:159-174 DOI: 10.1016/j.geb.2025.08.016 Access Statistics for this article Games and Economic Behavior is currently edited by E. Kalai More articles in Games and Economic Behavior from Elsevier |
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