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Conditional Cooperation:Review and Refinement

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  • Christian Thöni
  • Stefan Volk

Abstract

Fischbacher, Gächter, and Fehr (2001), henceforth FGF, introduced an experimental design to measure conditional cooperation in public goods games. We collected data from 17 replication studies of FGF and observed that the criteria used to identify types are not always consistent. We refine FGF’s definition of types to resolve ambiguous cases in FGF and its replications. Using our new classification scheme, we find in our combined data set with more than 7,000 individual observations that FGF’s original findings are by-and-large stable: conditional cooperation is the predominant pattern; free-riding is frequent, while non-minimal, unconditional cooperation is very rare.

Suggested Citation

  • Christian Thöni & Stefan Volk, 2018. "Conditional Cooperation:Review and Refinement," Cahiers de Recherches Economiques du Département d'économie 18.03, Université de Lausanne, Faculté des HEC, Département d’économie.
    • Handle: RePEc:lau:crdeep:18.03
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    References listed on IDEAS

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    1. Fischbacher, Urs & Gächter, Simon & Quercia, Simone, 2012. "The behavioral validity of the strategy method in public good experiments," Journal of Economic Psychology, Elsevier, vol. 33(4), pages 897-913.
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    More about this item

    Keywords

    Conditional cooperation; public goods game; replication;
    All these keywords.

    JEL classification:

    • H41 - Public Economics - - Publicly Provided Goods - - - Public Goods
    • C91 - Mathematical and Quantitative Methods - - Design of Experiments - - - Laboratory, Individual Behavior
    • C72 - Mathematical and Quantitative Methods - - Game Theory and Bargaining Theory - - - Noncooperative Games

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