IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/p/vcu/wpaper/1704.html
   My bibliography  Save this paper

Feelings of Ownership in Dictator Games

Author

Listed:
  • Korenok Oleg

    (Department of Economics, VCU School of Business)

  • Edward L. Millner

    (Department of Economics, VCU School of Business)

  • Laura Razzolini

    (Department of Economics, VCU School of Business)

Abstract

This paper determines if differences in feelings of ownership mediate the effect of changing who earns the endowment and the frame of actions on dictatorsÕ generosity. We conduct an experiment with two treatments. The Dictator Earns-Give treatment is designed to induce strong feelings of ownership, while the Recipient Earns-Take treatment induces weak feelings of ownership. We measure feelings of ownership in the two treatments. As expected, dictators report stronger feelings of ownership in the first treatment and these feelings mediate the dictatorÕs generosity. Moving from the Recipient Earns-Take treatment to the Dictator Earns-Give treatment indirectly reduces the payoff to the recipient by increasing the dictatorsÕ feelings of ownership.

Suggested Citation

  • Korenok Oleg & Edward L. Millner & Laura Razzolini, 2017. "Feelings of Ownership in Dictator Games," Working Papers 1704, VCU School of Business, Department of Economics.
    • Handle: RePEc:vcu:wpaper:1704
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://www.people.vcu.edu/~okorenok/repec_files/Feelingsofownershipandallocationindictatorgames_Feb2017.pdf
    File Function: Revision
    Download Restriction: no
    ---><---

    Other versions of this item:

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Hoffman Elizabeth & McCabe Kevin & Shachat Keith & Smith Vernon, 1994. "Preferences, Property Rights, and Anonymity in Bargaining Games," Games and Economic Behavior, Elsevier, vol. 7(3), pages 346-380, November.
    2. Ben Greiner, 2015. "Subject pool recruitment procedures: organizing experiments with ORSEE," Journal of the Economic Science Association, Springer;Economic Science Association, vol. 1(1), pages 114-125, July.
    3. Anna Dreber & Tore Ellingsen & Magnus Johannesson & David Rand, 2013. "Do people care about social context? Framing effects in dictator games," Experimental Economics, Springer;Economic Science Association, vol. 16(3), pages 349-371, September.
    4. Todd L. Cherry & Peter Frykblom & Jason F. Shogren, 2002. "Hardnose the Dictator," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 92(4), pages 1218-1221, September.
    5. Oleg Korenok & Edward Millner & Laura Razzolini, 2014. "Taking, giving, and impure altruism in dictator games," Experimental Economics, Springer;Economic Science Association, vol. 17(3), pages 488-500, September.
    6. Daniel H. Cole & Peter Z. Grossman, 2002. "The Meaning of Property Rights: Law versus Economics?," Land Economics, University of Wisconsin Press, vol. 78(3), pages 317-330.
    7. Branas-Garza, Pablo, 2007. "Promoting helping behavior with framing in dictator games," Journal of Economic Psychology, Elsevier, vol. 28(4), pages 477-486, August.
    8. Knetsch, Jack L. & Wong, Wei-Kang, 2009. "The endowment effect and the reference state: Evidence and manipulations," Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, Elsevier, vol. 71(2), pages 407-413, August.
    9. Christoph Engel, 2011. "Dictator games: a meta study," Experimental Economics, Springer;Economic Science Association, vol. 14(4), pages 583-610, November.
    10. repec:cup:judgdm:v:2:y:2007:i::p:107-114 is not listed on IDEAS
    11. Dufwenberg, Martin & Gächter, Simon & Hennig-Schmidt, Heike, 2011. "The framing of games and the psychology of play," Games and Economic Behavior, Elsevier, vol. 73(2), pages 459-478.
    12. Kettner, Sara Elisa & Waichman, Israel, 2016. "Old age and prosocial behavior: Social preferences or experimental confounds?," Journal of Economic Psychology, Elsevier, vol. 53(C), pages 118-130.
    13. Cherry, Todd L., 2001. "Mental accounting and other-regarding behavior: Evidence from the lab," Journal of Economic Psychology, Elsevier, vol. 22(5), pages 605-615, October.
    14. Oxoby, Robert J. & Spraggon, John, 2008. "Mine and yours: Property rights in dictator games," Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, Elsevier, vol. 65(3-4), pages 703-713, March.
    15. Grossman, Philip J. & Eckel, Catherine C., 2015. "Giving versus taking for a cause," Economics Letters, Elsevier, vol. 132(C), pages 28-30.
    16. Joann Peck & Suzanne B. Shu, 2009. "The Effect of Mere Touch on Perceived Ownership," Journal of Consumer Research, Journal of Consumer Research Inc., vol. 36(3), pages 434-447.
    17. Benjamin Bushong & Lindsay M. King & Colin F. Camerer & Antonio Rangel, 2010. "Pavlovian Processes in Consumer Choice: The Physical Presence of a Good Increases Willingness-to-Pay," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 100(4), pages 1556-1571, September.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Citations

    Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
    as


    Cited by:

    1. Elif E. Demiral & Johanna Mollerstrom, 2017. "Entitled Women – but Not Men – Make Tougher Strategic Demands as Proposers in the Ultimatum Game," Discussion Papers of DIW Berlin 1708, DIW Berlin, German Institute for Economic Research.
    2. De Geest, Lawrence R. & Kidwai, Abdul H. & Portillo, Javier E., 2022. "Ours, not yours: Property rights, poaching and deterrence in common-pool resources," Journal of Economic Psychology, Elsevier, vol. 89(C).
    3. Demiral, Elif E. & Mollerstrom, Johanna, 2020. "The entitlement effect in the ultimatum game – does it even exist?," Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, Elsevier, vol. 175(C), pages 341-352.
    4. Livingston, Jeffrey A. & Rasulmukhamedov, Rustam, 2023. "On the Interpretation of Giving in Dictator Games When the Recipient is a Charity," Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, Elsevier, vol. 208(C), pages 275-285.
    5. François Cochard & Alexandre Flage, 2023. "Sharing Losses in Dictator and Ultimatum Games: A Meta-Analysis," Working Papers 2023-09, CRESE.
    6. Cox, Caleb & Korenok, Oleg & Millner, Edward & Razzolini, Laura, 2018. "Giving, taking, earned money, and cooperation in public good games," Economics Letters, Elsevier, vol. 171(C), pages 211-213.
    7. Umer, Hamza, 2020. "Revisiting generosity in the dictator game: Experimental evidence from Pakistan," Journal of Behavioral and Experimental Economics (formerly The Journal of Socio-Economics), Elsevier, vol. 84(C).
    8. Ernesto Mesa-Vázquez & Ismael Rodriguez-Lara & Amparo Urbano, 2019. "Standard vs random dictator games. The effect of role uncertainty on generosity," ThE Papers 20/05, Department of Economic Theory and Economic History of the University of Granada..
    9. Faillo, Marco & Rizzolli, Matteo & Tontrup, Stephan, 2019. "Thou shalt not steal: Taking aversion with legal property claims," Journal of Economic Psychology, Elsevier, vol. 71(C), pages 88-101.
    10. Thunström, Linda, 2019. "Preferences for fairness over losses," Journal of Behavioral and Experimental Economics (formerly The Journal of Socio-Economics), Elsevier, vol. 83(C).
    11. Lisa Bruttel & Florian Stolley, 2018. "Gender Differences in the Response to Decision Power and Responsibility—Framing Effects in a Dictator Game," Games, MDPI, vol. 9(2), pages 1-16, May.
    12. Mesa-Vázquez, Ernesto & Rodriguez-Lara, Ismael & Urbano, Amparo, 2021. "Standard vs random dictator games: On the effects of role uncertainty and framing on generosity," Economics Letters, Elsevier, vol. 206(C).

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Faillo, Marco & Rizzolli, Matteo & Tontrup, Stephan, 2019. "Thou shalt not steal: Taking aversion with legal property claims," Journal of Economic Psychology, Elsevier, vol. 71(C), pages 88-101.
    2. Sebastian J. Goerg & David Rand & Gari Walkowitz, 2020. "Framing effects in the prisoner’s dilemma but not in the dictator game," Journal of the Economic Science Association, Springer;Economic Science Association, vol. 6(1), pages 1-12, June.
    3. Thunström, Linda, 2019. "Preferences for fairness over losses," Journal of Behavioral and Experimental Economics (formerly The Journal of Socio-Economics), Elsevier, vol. 83(C).
    4. Korenok, Oleg & Millner, Edward L. & Razzolini, Laura, 2018. "Taking aversion," Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, Elsevier, vol. 150(C), pages 397-403.
      • Korenok Oleg & Edward L. Millner & Laura Razzolini, 2017. "Taking Aversion," Working Papers 1702, VCU School of Business, Department of Economics.
    5. Eriksen, Kristoffer W. & Fest, Sebastian & Kvaløy, Ola & Dijk, Oege, 2022. "Fair advice," Journal of Banking & Finance, Elsevier, vol. 143(C).
    6. Subhasish M. Chowdhury & Joo Young Jeon & Bibhas Saha, 2017. "Gender Differences in the Giving and Taking Variants of the Dictator Game," Southern Economic Journal, John Wiley & Sons, vol. 84(2), pages 474-483, October.
    7. Kun Zhao & Yoshihisa Kashima & Luke D. Smillie, 2018. "From Windfall Sharing to Property Ownership: Prosocial Personality Traits in Giving and Taking Dictator Games," Games, MDPI, vol. 9(2), pages 1-18, May.
    8. Breitmoser, Yves & Vorjohann, Pauline, 2018. "Welfare-Based Altruism," Rationality and Competition Discussion Paper Series 89, CRC TRR 190 Rationality and Competition.
    9. Breitmoser, Yves & Vorjohann, Pauline, 2022. "Fairness-based Altruism," Center for Mathematical Economics Working Papers 666, Center for Mathematical Economics, Bielefeld University.
    10. Lisa Bruttel & Florian Stolley, 2018. "Gender Differences in the Response to Decision Power and Responsibility—Framing Effects in a Dictator Game," Games, MDPI, vol. 9(2), pages 1-16, May.
    11. Emin Karagözoğlu & Elif Tosun, 2022. "Endogenous Game Choice and Giving Behavior in Distribution Games," Games, MDPI, vol. 13(6), pages 1-32, November.
    12. Larney, Andrea & Rotella, Amanda & Barclay, Pat, 2019. "Stake size effects in ultimatum game and dictator game offers: A meta-analysis," Organizational Behavior and Human Decision Processes, Elsevier, vol. 151(C), pages 61-72.
    13. Ogawa, Kazuhito & Takemoto, Toru & Takahashi, Hiromasa & Suzuki, Akihiro, 2012. "Income earning opportunity and work performance affect donating behavior: Evidence from dictator game experiments," Journal of Behavioral and Experimental Economics (formerly The Journal of Socio-Economics), Elsevier, vol. 41(6), pages 816-826.
    14. Jeannette Brosig-Koch & Thomas Riechmann & Joachim Weimann, 2017. "The dynamics of behavior in modified dictator games," PLOS ONE, Public Library of Science, vol. 12(4), pages 1-18, April.
    15. Demiral, Elif E. & Mollerstrom, Johanna, 2020. "The entitlement effect in the ultimatum game – does it even exist?," Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, Elsevier, vol. 175(C), pages 341-352.
    16. Smith, Alexander, 2015. "On the nature of pessimism in taking and giving games," Journal of Behavioral and Experimental Economics (formerly The Journal of Socio-Economics), Elsevier, vol. 54(C), pages 50-57.
    17. Marius Alt & Carlo Gallier & Achim Schlüter & Katherine Nelson & Eva Anggraini, 2018. "Giving to versus Taking from In- and Out-Group Members," Games, MDPI, vol. 9(3), pages 1-14, August.
    18. Kassas, Bachir & Palma, Marco A., 2019. "Self-serving biases in social norm compliance," Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, Elsevier, vol. 159(C), pages 388-408.
    19. Becker, Johannes & Hopp, Daniel & Kriebel, Michael, 2020. "Mental accounting of public funds – The flypaper effect in the lab," Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, Elsevier, vol. 176(C), pages 321-336.
    20. Andreas Bergh & Philipp C Wichardt, 2022. "Mine or ours? Unintended framing effects in dictator games," Rationality and Society, , vol. 34(1), pages 78-95, February.

    More about this item

    Keywords

    dictator game; feelings of ownership; altruism;
    All these keywords.

    JEL classification:

    • C72 - Mathematical and Quantitative Methods - - Game Theory and Bargaining Theory - - - Noncooperative Games
    • C91 - Mathematical and Quantitative Methods - - Design of Experiments - - - Laboratory, Individual Behavior
    • D03 - Microeconomics - - General - - - Behavioral Microeconomics: Underlying Principles

    NEP fields

    This paper has been announced in the following NEP Reports:

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:vcu:wpaper:1704. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Oleg Korenok (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://edirc.repec.org/data/edvcuus.html .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.