Research output: Contribution to Journal/Magazine › Journal article › peer-review
Research output: Contribution to Journal/Magazine › Journal article › peer-review
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TY - JOUR
T1 - The effects of perceived anonymity on altruistic punishment
AU - Piazza, Jared
AU - Bering, Jesse
PY - 2008
Y1 - 2008
N2 - Previous studies investigating altruistic punishment have confounded the effects of two independent variables: information transmission (or breach of privacy) and personal identification (or breach of anonymity). Here we report findings from a brief study in which participants were asked to respond to a social norm violation (i.e., an anonymous actor had behaved selfishly in an economic game) by deciding whether to sacrifice their own endowment to punish this person. A third of the participants were told that their economic decisions would be made known to another player but could not be identified (privacy breach condition), whereas another third were informed that their decision as well as their names would be made known (anonymity breach condition). (The decisions of control participants were completely anonymous and private.) Participants also justified their economic decisions and reported their emotional experiences. The results were participants punished most in the privacy and anonymity breach conditions and least in the control condition. These findings have implications for existing evolutionary accounts of altruistic punishment.
AB - Previous studies investigating altruistic punishment have confounded the effects of two independent variables: information transmission (or breach of privacy) and personal identification (or breach of anonymity). Here we report findings from a brief study in which participants were asked to respond to a social norm violation (i.e., an anonymous actor had behaved selfishly in an economic game) by deciding whether to sacrifice their own endowment to punish this person. A third of the participants were told that their economic decisions would be made known to another player but could not be identified (privacy breach condition), whereas another third were informed that their decision as well as their names would be made known (anonymity breach condition). (The decisions of control participants were completely anonymous and private.) Participants also justified their economic decisions and reported their emotional experiences. The results were participants punished most in the privacy and anonymity breach conditions and least in the control condition. These findings have implications for existing evolutionary accounts of altruistic punishment.
KW - Altruistic punishment
KW - anonymity
KW - privacy
KW - reputation
KW - third-party punishment game
M3 - Journal article
VL - 6
SP - 487
EP - 501
JO - Evolutionary Psychology
JF - Evolutionary Psychology
IS - 3
ER -