What is considered deception in experimental economics?

Gary Charness, Anya Samek () and Jeroen Ven
Additional contact information
Anya Samek: University of California
Jeroen Ven: University of Amsterdam

Experimental Economics, 2022, vol. 25, issue 2, No 1, 385-412

Abstract: Abstract In experimental economics there is a norm against using deception. But precisely what constitutes deception is unclear. While there is a consensus view that providing false information is not permitted, there are also “gray areas” with respect to practices that omit information or are misleading without an explicit lie being told. In this paper, we report the results of a large survey among experimental economists and students concerning various specific gray areas. We find that there is substantial heterogeneity across respondent choices. The data indicate a perception that costs and benefits matter, so that such practices might in fact be appropriate when the topic is important and there is no other way to gather data. Compared to researchers, students have different attitudes about some of the methods in the specific scenarios that we ask about. Few students express awareness of the no-deception policy at their schools. We also briefly discuss some potential alternatives to “gray-area” deception, primarily based on suggestions offered by respondents.

Keywords: Experimental methodology; Deception; Attitudes (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: B49 C80 C91 C92 C93 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2022
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (25)

Downloads: (external link)
http://link.springer.com/10.1007/s10683-021-09726-7 Abstract (text/html)
Access to the full text of the articles in this series is restricted.

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:kap:expeco:v:25:y:2022:i:2:d:10.1007_s10683-021-09726-7

Ordering information: This journal article can be ordered from
http://www.springer. ... ry/journal/10683/PS2

DOI: 10.1007/s10683-021-09726-7

Access Statistics for this article

Experimental Economics is currently edited by David J. Cooper, Lata Gangadharan and Charles N. Noussair

More articles in Experimental Economics from Springer, Economic Science Association Contact information at EDIRC.
Bibliographic data for series maintained by Sonal Shukla () and Springer Nature Abstracting and Indexing ().