IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/eee/gamebe/v105y2017icp177-194.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Social motives vs social influence: An experiment on interdependent time preferences

Author

Listed:
  • Rodriguez-Lara, Ismael
  • Ponti, Giovanni

Abstract

We design an intertemporal Dictator Game to test whether Dictators modify their discounting behavior when their own decision is imposed on their matched Recipients. We run four different treatments to identify the effect of payoffs externalities from those related to information and beliefs. Our descriptive statistics show that Dictators display a marked propensity to account for the intertemporal preferences of Recipients, both in the presence of externalities (social motives) and/or when they know about the decisions of their matched partners (social influence). We also perform a structural estimation exercise to control for heterogeneity in risk attitudes. As for individual behavior, our estimates confirm previous studies in that high risk aversion is associated with low discounting. As for social behavior, we find that social motives outweigh social influence, especially when we restrict our sample to pairs of Dictators and Recipients who satisfy minimal consistency conditions.

Suggested Citation

  • Rodriguez-Lara, Ismael & Ponti, Giovanni, 2017. "Social motives vs social influence: An experiment on interdependent time preferences," Games and Economic Behavior, Elsevier, vol. 105(C), pages 177-194.
    • Handle: RePEc:eee:gamebe:v:105:y:2017:i:c:p:177-194
    DOI: 10.1016/j.geb.2017.06.007
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0899825617301057
    Download Restriction: Full text for ScienceDirect subscribers only
    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.1016/j.geb.2017.06.007?utm_source=ideas
    LibKey link: if access is restricted and if your library uses this service, LibKey will redirect you to where you can use your library subscription to access this item
    ---><---

    As the access to this document is restricted, you may want to search for a different version of it.

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Ola Andersson & Håkan J. Holm & Jean-Robert Tyran & Erik Wengström, 2016. "Deciding for Others Reduces Loss Aversion," Management Science, INFORMS, vol. 62(1), pages 29-36, January.
    2. Eyal Winter, 2004. "Incentives and Discrimination," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 94(3), pages 764-773, June.
    3. Ernst Fehr & Klaus M. Schmidt, 1999. "A Theory of Fairness, Competition, and Cooperation," The Quarterly Journal of Economics, President and Fellows of Harvard College, vol. 114(3), pages 817-868.
    4. Steffen Andersen & John Fountain & Glenn Harrison & E. Rutström, 2014. "Estimating subjective probabilities," Journal of Risk and Uncertainty, Springer, vol. 48(3), pages 207-229, June.
    5. Andersen, Steffen & Harrison, Glenn W. & Lau, Morten I. & Rutström, E. Elisabet, 2014. "Discounting behavior: A reconsideration," European Economic Review, Elsevier, vol. 71(C), pages 15-33.
    6. Angela A. Hung & Charles R. Plott, 2001. "Information Cascades: Replication and an Extension to Majority Rule and Conformity-Rewarding Institutions," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 91(5), pages 1508-1520, December.
    7. Matthias Sutter & Martin G. Kocher & Daniela Glätzle-Rützler & Stefan T. Trautmann, 2013. "Impatience and Uncertainty: Experimental Decisions Predict Adolescents' Field Behavior," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 103(1), pages 510-531, February.
    8. Steffen Andersen & Glenn W. Harrison & Morten I. Lau & E. Elisabet Rutström, 2008. "Eliciting Risk and Time Preferences," Econometrica, Econometric Society, vol. 76(3), pages 583-618, May.
    9. Robberstad, Bjarne, 2005. "Estimation of private and social time preferences for health in northern Tanzania," Social Science & Medicine, Elsevier, vol. 61(7), pages 1597-1607, October.
    10. Sujoy Chakravarty & Glenn W. Harrison & Ernan E. Haruvy & E. Elisabet Rutström, 2011. "Are You Risk Averse over Other People's Money?," Southern Economic Journal, John Wiley & Sons, vol. 77(4), pages 901-913, April.
    11. Susan Laury & Melayne McInnes & J. Todd Swarthout, 2012. "Avoiding the curves: Direct elicitation of time preferences," Journal of Risk and Uncertainty, Springer, vol. 44(3), pages 181-217, June.
    12. Yoram Halevy, 2008. "Strotz Meets Allais: Diminishing Impatience and the Certainty Effect," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 98(3), pages 1145-1162, June.
    13. Browning, Martin, 2000. " The Saving Behaviour of a Two-Person Household," Scandinavian Journal of Economics, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 102(2), pages 235-251, June.
    14. John D. Hey & Chris Orme, 2018. "Investigating Generalizations Of Expected Utility Theory Using Experimental Data," World Scientific Book Chapters, in: Experiments in Economics Decision Making and Markets, chapter 3, pages 63-98, World Scientific Publishing Co. Pte. Ltd..
    15. James Andreoni & Charles Sprenger, 2012. "Estimating Time Preferences from Convex Budgets," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 102(7), pages 3333-3356, December.
    16. Glenn W. Harrison & Morten I. Lau & E. Elisabet Rutström & Marcela Tarazona-Gómez, 2013. "Preferences over social risk," Oxford Economic Papers, Oxford University Press, vol. 65(1), pages 25-46, January.
    17. Feri, Francesco & Meléndez-Jiménez, Miguel A. & Ponti, Giovanni & Vega-Redondo, Fernando, 2011. "Error cascades in observational learning: An experiment on the Chinos game," Games and Economic Behavior, Elsevier, vol. 73(1), pages 136-146, September.
    18. Bin Miao & Songfa Zhong, 2015. "Risk Preferences Are Not Time Preferences: Separating Risk and Time Preference: Comment," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 105(7), pages 2272-2286, July.
    19. Starmer, Chris & Sugden, Robert, 1991. "Does the Random-Lottery Incentive System Elicit True Preferences? An Experimental Investigation," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 81(4), pages 971-978, September.
    20. Charles A. Holt & Susan K. Laury, 2005. "Risk Aversion and Incentive Effects: New Data without Order Effects," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 95(3), pages 902-912, June.
    21. Krupka, Erin & Weber, Roberto A., 2009. "The focusing and informational effects of norms on pro-social behavior," Journal of Economic Psychology, Elsevier, vol. 30(3), pages 307-320, June.
    22. Bernardo Moreno & María del Pino Ramos-Sosa, 2017. "Conformity in voting," Social Choice and Welfare, Springer;The Society for Social Choice and Welfare, vol. 48(3), pages 519-543, March.
    23. Charles A. Holt & Susan K. Laury, 2002. "Risk Aversion and Incentive Effects," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 92(5), pages 1644-1655, December.
    24. Thomas Epper & Helga Fehr-Duda & Adrian Bruhin, 2011. "Viewing the future through a warped lens: Why uncertainty generates hyperbolic discounting," Journal of Risk and Uncertainty, Springer, vol. 43(3), pages 169-203, December.
    25. Steffen Andersen & Glenn Harrison & Morten Lau & E. Rutström, 2009. "Elicitation using multiple price list formats," Experimental Economics, Springer;Economic Science Association, vol. 12(3), pages 365-366, September.
    26. Tomomi Tanaka & Colin F. Camerer & Quang Nguyen, 2010. "Risk and Time Preferences: Linking Experimental and Household Survey Data from Vietnam," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 100(1), pages 557-571, March.
    27. John Hey & Jinkwon Lee, 2005. "Do Subjects Separate (or Are They Sophisticated)?," Experimental Economics, Springer;Economic Science Association, vol. 8(3), pages 233-265, September.
    28. Bikhchandani, Sushil & Hirshleifer, David & Welch, Ivo, 1992. "A Theory of Fads, Fashion, Custom, and Cultural Change in Informational Cascades," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 100(5), pages 992-1026, October.
    29. Edward L. Glaeser & David I. Laibson & José A. Scheinkman & Christine L. Soutter, 2000. "Measuring Trust," The Quarterly Journal of Economics, President and Fellows of Harvard College, vol. 115(3), pages 811-846.
      • Glaeser, Edward Ludwig & Laibson, David I. & Scheinkman, Jose A. & Soutter, Christine L., 2000. "Measuring Trust," Scholarly Articles 4481497, Harvard University Department of Economics.
    30. E. S. Phelps & R. A. Pollak, 1968. "On Second-Best National Saving and Game-Equilibrium Growth," The Review of Economic Studies, Review of Economic Studies Ltd, vol. 35(2), pages 185-199.
    31. Maribeth Coller & Glenn W. Harrison & E. Elisabet Rutström, 2012. "Latent process heterogeneity in discounting behavior," Oxford Economic Papers, Oxford University Press, vol. 64(2), pages 375-391, April.
    32. Lazaro, Angelina & Barberan, Ramon & Rubio, Encarnacion, 2002. "The discounted utility model and social preferences:: Some alternative formulations to conventional discounting," Journal of Economic Psychology, Elsevier, vol. 23(3), pages 317-337, June.
    33. Antonio Cabrales & Raffaele Miniaci & Marco Piovesan & Giovanni Ponti, 2010. "Social Preferences and Strategic Uncertainty: An Experiment on Markets and Contracts," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 100(5), pages 2261-2278, December.
    34. Mohammed Abdellaoui & Olivier l'Haridon & Corina Paraschiv, 2013. "Do Couples Discount Future Consequences Less than Individuals?," Economics Working Paper Archive (University of Rennes 1 & University of Caen) 201320, Center for Research in Economics and Management (CREM), University of Rennes 1, University of Caen and CNRS.
    35. Kovarik, Jaromir, 2009. "Giving it now or later: Altruism and discounting," Economics Letters, Elsevier, vol. 102(3), pages 152-154, March.
    36. Maurizio Mazzocco, 2007. "Household Intertemporal Behaviour: A Collective Characterization and a Test of Commitment," The Review of Economic Studies, Review of Economic Studies Ltd, vol. 74(3), pages 857-895.
    37. Abhijit V. Banerjee, 1992. "A Simple Model of Herd Behavior," The Quarterly Journal of Economics, President and Fellows of Harvard College, vol. 107(3), pages 797-817.
    38. Urs Fischbacher, 2007. "z-Tree: Zurich toolbox for ready-made economic experiments," Experimental Economics, Springer;Economic Science Association, vol. 10(2), pages 171-178, June.
    39. Quang Nguyen & Colin Camerer & Tomomi Tanaka, 2010. "Risk and Time Preferences Linking Experimental and Household Data from Vietnam," Post-Print halshs-00547090, HAL.
    40. Shane Frederick, 2005. "Cognitive Reflection and Decision Making," Journal of Economic Perspectives, American Economic Association, vol. 19(4), pages 25-42, Fall.
    41. Robin Cubitt & Chris Starmer & Robert Sugden, 1998. "On the Validity of the Random Lottery Incentive System," Experimental Economics, Springer;Economic Science Association, vol. 1(2), pages 115-131, September.
    42. James Andreoni & Charles Sprenger, 2012. "Risk Preferences Are Not Time Preferences," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 102(7), pages 3357-3376, December.
    43. Andreoni, James & Kuhn, Michael A. & Sprenger, Charles, 2015. "Measuring time preferences: A comparison of experimental methods," Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, Elsevier, vol. 116(C), pages 451-464.
    44. Stephen L. Cheung, 2015. "Risk Preferences Are Not Time Preferences: On the Elicitation of Time Preference under Conditions of Risk: Comment," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 105(7), pages 2242-2260, July.
    45. Shane Frederick & George Loewenstein & Ted O'Donoghue, 2002. "Time Discounting and Time Preference: A Critical Review," Journal of Economic Literature, American Economic Association, vol. 40(2), pages 351-401, June.
    46. Daniel J. Benjamin & Sebastian A. Brown & Jesse M. Shapiro, 2013. "Who Is ‘Behavioral’? Cognitive Ability And Anomalous Preferences," Journal of the European Economic Association, European Economic Association, vol. 11(6), pages 1231-1255, December.
    47. Frignani, Nicola & Ponti, Giovanni, 2012. "Risk versus social preferences under the veil of ignorance," Economics Letters, Elsevier, vol. 116(2), pages 143-146.
    48. Ai, Chunrong & Norton, Edward C., 2003. "Interaction terms in logit and probit models," Economics Letters, Elsevier, vol. 80(1), pages 123-129, July.
    49. Jacob K. Goeree & Leeat Yariv, 2015. "Conformity in the lab," Journal of the Economic Science Association, Springer;Economic Science Association, vol. 1(1), pages 15-28, July.
    50. Catherine C. Eckel & Philip J. Grossman, 2008. "Forecasting Risk Attitudes: An Experimental Study Using Actual and Forecast Gamble Choices," Monash Economics Working Papers archive-01, Monash University, Department of Economics.
    51. Maribeth Coller & Melonie Williams, 1999. "Eliciting Individual Discount Rates," Experimental Economics, Springer;Economic Science Association, vol. 2(2), pages 107-127, December.
    52. Benhabib, Jess & Bisin, Alberto & Schotter, Andrew, 2010. "Present-bias, quasi-hyperbolic discounting, and fixed costs," Games and Economic Behavior, Elsevier, vol. 69(2), pages 205-223, July.
    53. Angelina Lazaro & Ramon Barberan & Encarnacion Rubio, 2001. "Private and social time preferences for health and money: an empirical estimation," Health Economics, John Wiley & Sons, Ltd., vol. 10(4), pages 351-356, June.
    54. Stephan Meier & Charles D. Sprenger, 2015. "Temporal Stability of Time Preferences," The Review of Economics and Statistics, MIT Press, vol. 97(2), pages 273-286, May.
    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. Gary Charness & Celia Blanco-Jimenez & Lara Ezquerra & Ismael Rodriguez-Lara, 2019. "Cheating, incentives, and money manipulation," Experimental Economics, Springer;Economic Science Association, vol. 22(1), pages 155-177, March.
    2. Rong Rong & Therese C. Grijalva & Jayson Lusk & W. Douglass Shaw, 2019. "Interpersonal discounting," Journal of Risk and Uncertainty, Springer, vol. 58(1), pages 17-42, February.
    3. Felix Koelle & Lukas Wenner, 2018. "Present-Biased Generosity: Time Inconsistency across Individual and Social Contexts," Discussion Papers 2018-02, The Centre for Decision Research and Experimental Economics, School of Economics, University of Nottingham.
    4. Felix Koelle & Thomas Lauer, 2018. "Cooperation, Discounting, and the Effects of Delayed Costs and Benefits," Discussion Papers 2018-10, The Centre for Decision Research and Experimental Economics, School of Economics, University of Nottingham.
    5. Kirsten Rohde & Job van Exel & Merel van Hulsen, 2022. "Weighting the Waiting: Intertemporal Social Preferences," Tinbergen Institute Discussion Papers 22-023/I, Tinbergen Institute.
    6. Kölle, Felix & Wenner, Lukas, 2019. "Time-Inconsistent Generosity: Present Bias across Individual and Social Contexts," VfS Annual Conference 2019 (Leipzig): 30 Years after the Fall of the Berlin Wall - Democracy and Market Economy 203505, Verein für Socialpolitik / German Economic Association.

    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. Rodriguez-Lara, Ismael & Ponti, Giovanni, 2017. "Social Motives vs Social Influence: an Experiment on Time Preferences," MPRA Paper 76486, University Library of Munich, Germany.
    2. Giovanni Ponti & Ismael Rodriguez-Lara & Daniela Di Cagno, 2014. "Doing it now or later with payoff externalities: Experimental evidence on social time preferences," Working Papers CESARE 1/2014, Dipartimento di Economia e Finanza, LUISS Guido Carli.
    3. Jindrich Matousek & Tomas Havranek & Zuzana Irsova, 2022. "Individual discount rates: a meta-analysis of experimental evidence," Experimental Economics, Springer;Economic Science Association, vol. 25(1), pages 318-358, February.
    4. Stephen L. Cheung, 2020. "Eliciting utility curvature in time preference," Experimental Economics, Springer;Economic Science Association, vol. 23(2), pages 493-525, June.
    5. W. David Bradford & Paul Dolan & Matteo M. Galizzi, 2019. "Looking ahead: Subjective time perception and individual discounting," Journal of Risk and Uncertainty, Springer, vol. 58(1), pages 43-69, February.
    6. Andersen, Steffen & Harrison, Glenn W. & Lau, Morten I. & Rutström, E. Elisabet, 2014. "Discounting behavior: A reconsideration," European Economic Review, Elsevier, vol. 71(C), pages 15-33.
    7. Irvine, Alastair & van der Pol, Marjon & Phimister, Euan, 2019. "A comparison of professional and private time preferences of General Practitioners," Social Science & Medicine, Elsevier, vol. 222(C), pages 256-264.
    8. Galizzi, Matteo M. & Miraldo, Marisa & Stavropoulou, Charitini & van der Pol, Marjon, 2016. "Doctor–patient differences in risk and time preferences: A field experiment," Journal of Health Economics, Elsevier, vol. 50(C), pages 171-182.
    9. Robin Chark & Soo Chew & Songfa Zhong, 2015. "Extended present bias: a direct experimental test," Theory and Decision, Springer, vol. 79(1), pages 151-165, July.
    10. Jonathan Chapman & Erik Snowberg & Stephanie Wang & Colin Camerer, 2018. "Loss Attitudes in the U.S. Population: Evidence from Dynamically Optimized Sequential Experimentation (DOSE)," NBER Working Papers 25072, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    11. Königsheim, C. & Lukas, M. & Nöth, M., 2018. "Individual preferences and the exponential growth bias," Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, Elsevier, vol. 145(C), pages 352-369.
    12. Ubfal, Diego, 2016. "How general are time preferences? Eliciting good-specific discount rates," Journal of Development Economics, Elsevier, vol. 118(C), pages 150-170.
    13. Cheung, Stephen L., 2016. "Recent developments in the experimental elicitation of time preference," Journal of Behavioral and Experimental Finance, Elsevier, vol. 11(C), pages 1-8.
    14. Felix Holzmeister & Matthias Stefan, 2021. "The risk elicitation puzzle revisited: Across-methods (in)consistency?," Experimental Economics, Springer;Economic Science Association, vol. 24(2), pages 593-616, June.
    15. Hermann, Daniel & Musshoff, Oliver, 2016. "Measuring time preferences: Comparing methods and evaluating the magnitude effect," Journal of Behavioral and Experimental Economics (formerly The Journal of Socio-Economics), Elsevier, vol. 65(C), pages 16-26.
    16. Galizzi, Matteo M. & Machado, Sara R. & Miniaci, Raffaele, 2016. "Temporal stability, cross-validity, and external validity of risk preferences measures: experimental evidence from a UK representative sample," LSE Research Online Documents on Economics 67554, London School of Economics and Political Science, LSE Library.
    17. Cheung, Stephen L., 2016. "Recent developments in the experimental elicitation of time preference," Journal of Behavioral and Experimental Finance, Elsevier, vol. 11(C), pages 1-8.
    18. Pablo Brañas-Garza & Diego Jorrat & Antonio M. Espín & Angel Sánchez, 2023. "Paid and hypothetical time preferences are the same: lab, field and online evidence," Experimental Economics, Springer;Economic Science Association, vol. 26(2), pages 412-434, April.
    19. Tamás Csermely & Alexander Rabas, 2016. "How to reveal people’s preferences: Comparing time consistency and predictive power of multiple price list risk elicitation methods," Journal of Risk and Uncertainty, Springer, vol. 53(2), pages 107-136, December.
    20. Holzmeister, Felix & Stefan, Matthias, 2019. "The Risk Elicitation Puzzle Revisited: Across-Methods (In)consistency?," OSF Preprints pj9u2, Center for Open Science.

    More about this item

    Keywords

    Social preferences; Risk and time preferences; Social influence; Belief elicitation;
    All these keywords.

    JEL classification:

    • C91 - Mathematical and Quantitative Methods - - Design of Experiments - - - Laboratory, Individual Behavior
    • D70 - Microeconomics - - Analysis of Collective Decision-Making - - - General
    • D81 - Microeconomics - - Information, Knowledge, and Uncertainty - - - Criteria for Decision-Making under Risk and Uncertainty
    • D91 - Microeconomics - - Micro-Based Behavioral Economics - - - Role and Effects of Psychological, Emotional, Social, and Cognitive Factors on Decision Making

    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:eee:gamebe:v:105:y:2017:i:c:p:177-194. 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: Catherine Liu (email available below). General contact details of provider: http://www.elsevier.com/locate/inca/622836 .

    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.