Accepted author manuscript, 985 KB, PDF document
Available under license: CC BY: Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License
Final published version
Research output: Contribution to Journal/Magazine › Journal article › peer-review
Research output: Contribution to Journal/Magazine › Journal article › peer-review
}
TY - JOUR
T1 - Position uncertainty in a sequential public goods game
T2 - an experiment
AU - Anwar, Chowdhury Mohammad Sakib
AU - Georgalos, Konstantinos
PY - 2024/9/30
Y1 - 2024/9/30
N2 - Gallice and Monzón (Econ J 129(621):2137–2154, 2019) present present a natural environment that sustains full co-operation in one-shot social dilemmas among a finite number of self-interested agents. They demonstrate that in a sequential public goods game, where agents lack knowledge of their position in the sequence but can observe some predecessors’ actions, full contribution emerges in equilibrium due to agents’ incentive to induce potential successors to follow suit. In this study, we aim to test the theoretical predictions of this model through an economic experiment. We conducted three treatments, varying the amount of information about past actions that a subject can observe, as well as their positional awareness. Through rigorous structural econometric analysis, we found that approximately 25% of the subjects behaved in line with the theoretical predictions. However, we also observed the presence of alternative behavioural types among the remaining subjects. The majority were classified as conditional co-operators, showing a willingness to cooperate based on others’ actions. Some subjects exhibited altruistic tendencies, while only a small minority engaged in free-riding behaviour.
AB - Gallice and Monzón (Econ J 129(621):2137–2154, 2019) present present a natural environment that sustains full co-operation in one-shot social dilemmas among a finite number of self-interested agents. They demonstrate that in a sequential public goods game, where agents lack knowledge of their position in the sequence but can observe some predecessors’ actions, full contribution emerges in equilibrium due to agents’ incentive to induce potential successors to follow suit. In this study, we aim to test the theoretical predictions of this model through an economic experiment. We conducted three treatments, varying the amount of information about past actions that a subject can observe, as well as their positional awareness. Through rigorous structural econometric analysis, we found that approximately 25% of the subjects behaved in line with the theoretical predictions. However, we also observed the presence of alternative behavioural types among the remaining subjects. The majority were classified as conditional co-operators, showing a willingness to cooperate based on others’ actions. Some subjects exhibited altruistic tendencies, while only a small minority engaged in free-riding behaviour.
KW - C91
KW - Conditional co-operation
KW - D64
KW - Experiment
KW - Finite mixture models
KW - H41
KW - Position uncertainty
KW - Social dilemma
U2 - 10.1007/s10683-024-09831-3
DO - 10.1007/s10683-024-09831-3
M3 - Journal article
AN - SCOPUS:85195636400
VL - 27
SP - 820
EP - 853
JO - Experimental Economics
JF - Experimental Economics
SN - 1386-4157
IS - 4
ER -