IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/p/ter/wpaper/00166.html

A stranger in a strange land: Promises and identity

Author

Listed:
  • Gary Charness
  • Giovanni Di Bartolomeo
  • Stefano Papa

Abstract

This study investigates how communication and promises interact with social identity and in-group favoritism. Using a laboratory experiment based on a random dictator game with pre-play communication, group membership, and a partner-switching mechanism, the paper examines whether communication can improve trust and cooperation between out-group members. The results show that communication increases cooperation but does not by itself eliminate the social identity gap. However, mutual promises are more effective for out-groups than for in-groups, reducing or eliminating in-group favoritism. The study also finds evidence that decisions are driven by different motivations across groups: expectation-based motivations in the case of in-groups and moral commitment in the case of out-groups.

Suggested Citation

  • Gary Charness & Giovanni Di Bartolomeo & Stefano Papa, 2023. "A stranger in a strange land: Promises and identity," CIMEO Working Paper Series 166, Centre for Investigation and Modelling of Experimental Observations (CIMEO).
    • Handle: RePEc:ter:wpaper:00166
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://www.dipecodir.it/wpcom/data/wp_no_166_2023.pdf
    Download Restriction: no
    ---><---

    Other versions of this item:

    More about this item

    Keywords

    ;
    ;
    ;
    ;
    ;

    JEL classification:

    • A13 - General Economics and Teaching - - General Economics - - - Relation of Economics to Social Values
    • C91 - Mathematical and Quantitative Methods - - Design of Experiments - - - Laboratory, Individual Behavior
    • D03 - Microeconomics - - General - - - Behavioral Microeconomics: Underlying Principles
    • D64 - Microeconomics - - Welfare Economics - - - Altruism; Philanthropy; Intergenerational Transfers
    • D90 - Microeconomics - - Micro-Based Behavioral Economics - - - General

    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:ter:wpaper:00166. 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.

    We have no bibliographic references for this item. You can help adding them by using 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: Giovanni Di Bartolomeo (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://edirc.repec.org/data/cmrosit.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.