We conduct a modified dictator game in order to analyze the role self-image concerns play in other-regarding behavior. While we generally follow Konow (2000), a cognitive dissonance-based model of other-regarding behavior in dictator games, we relax one of its assumptions as we allow for individual heterogeneity among individuals’ standards of behavior. Subjects’ self-image, their belief regarding the average socially appropriate behavior of others and our proxies for the cognitive dissonance costs are positively correlated with the dictator game choices. We also find that subjects whose choices involve two psychologically inconsistent cognitions indeed report higher levels of experienced conflict and take more time for their decisions (our proxies for cognitive dissonance).
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30 December 2015
Research Article|
December 30 2015
More Than Outcomes: The Role of Self-Image in Other-Regarding Behavior
Astrid Matthey;
Astrid Matthey
Max Planck Institute of Economics
, Jena, Germany
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Tobias Regner
Tobias Regner
Max Planck Institute of Economics
, Jena, Germany
University of Jena
, Germany
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*
We would like to thank audiences at the EEA congress in Glasgow and at IMEBE in Granada for their feedback. We are grateful to James Konow, Rosemarie Nagel, Ondřej Rydval, Joel Sobel and Toru Suzuki for valuable comments on earlier versions. Michael Enukashvili, Nadine Erdmann and Andreas Lehmann provided excellent research assistance.
Online ISSN: 2326-6201
Print ISSN: 2326-6198
© 2015 A. Matthey and T. Regner
2015
A. Matthey and T. Regner
Licensed re-use rights only
Review of Behavioral Economics (2015) 2 (4): 353–378.
Citation
Matthey A, Regner T (2015), "More Than Outcomes: The Role of Self-Image in Other-Regarding Behavior". Review of Behavioral Economics, Vol. 2 No. 4 pp. 353–378, doi: https://doi.org/10.1561/105.00000038
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