69 research outputs found
Self-Serving Assessments of Fairness and Pretrial Bargaining
A persistently troubling question in the legal-economic literature is why cases proceed to trial. Litigation is a negative-sum proposition for the litigants-the longer the process continues, the lower their aggregate wealth. Although civil litigation is resolved by settlement in an estimated 95 percent of all disputes, what accounts for the failure of the remaining 5 percent to settle prior to trial
Regulation for Conservatives: Behavioral Economics and the Case for "Asymmetric Paternalism"
Regulation by the state can take a variety of forms. Some regulations are aimed entirely at redistribution, such as when we tax the rich and give to the poor. Other regulations seek to counteract externalities by restricting behavior in a way that imposes harm on an individual basis but yields net societal benefits. A good example is taxation to fund public goods such as roads. In such situations, an individual would be better off if she alone were exempt from the tax; she benefits when everyone (including herself) must pay the tax
In Search of Homo Economicus: Behavioral Experiments in 15 Small-Scale Societies
We can summarize our results as follows. First, the canonical model is not supported in any society studied. Second, there is considerably more behavioral variability across groups than had been found in previous cross-cultural research, and the canonical model fails in a wider variety of ways than in previous experiments. Third, group-level differences in economic organization and the degree of market integration explain a substantial portion of the behavioral variation across societies: the higher the degree of market integration and the higher the payoffs to cooperation, the greater the level of cooperation in experimental games. Fourth, individual-level economic and demographic variables do not explain behavior either within or across groups. Fifth, behavior in the experiments is generally consistent with economic patterns of everyday life in these societies
Biased Judgments of Fairness in Bargaining
When court trials (or arbitration) are the
mechanisms for resolving bargaining impasses,
the costs and risks associated with
third-party intervention should motivate
settlement (Henry Farber and Harry Katz,
1979). However, empirical evidence suggests
that impasses and inefficient settlements are
common in the legal system and in contract
negotiations. For example, one study of asbestos
suits found that only 37 cents of every dollar
spent by both sides end up in the plaintiffs'
hands (James Kakalik et al., 1983)
Regulation for Conservatives: Behavioral Economics and the Case for "Asymmetric Paternalism"
βEconomic manβ in cross-cultural perspective: Behavioral experiments in 15 small-scale societies
Researchers from across the social sciences have found consistent deviations from the predictions of the canonical model of self-interest in hundreds of experiments from around the world. This research, however, cannot determine whether the uniformity results from universal patterns of human behavior or from the limited cultural variation available among the university students used in virtually all prior experimental work. To address this, we undertook a cross-cultural study of behavior in ultimatum, public goods, and dictator games in a range of small-scale societies exhibiting a wide variety of economic and cultural conditions. We found, first, that the canonical model β based on self-interest β fails in all of the societies studied. Second, our data reveal substantially more behavioral variability across social groups than has been found in previous research. Third, group-level differences in economic organization and the structure of social interactions explain a substantial portion of the behavioral variation across societies: the higher the degree of market integration and the higher the payoffs to cooperation in everyday life, the greater the level of prosociality expressed in experimental games. Fourth, the available individual-level economic and demographic variables do not consistently explain game behavior, either within or across groups. Fifth, in many cases experimental play appears to reflect the common interactional patterns of everyday life
The Wick in the Candle of Learning: Epistemic Curiosity Activates Reward Circuitry and Enhances Memory
Curiosity has been described as a desire for
learning and knowledge, but its underlying mechanisms
are not well understood. We scanned subjects with functional
magnetic resonance imaging while they read trivia
questions. The level of curiosity when reading questions
was correlated with activity in caudate regions previously
suggested to be involved in anticipated reward. This
finding led to a behavioral study, which showed that subjects
spent more scarce resources (either limited tokens or
waiting time) to find out answers when they were more
curious. The functional imaging also showed that curiosity
increased activity in memory areas when subjects guessed
incorrectly, which suggests that curiosity may enhance
memory for surprising new information. This prediction
about memory enhancement was confirmed in a behavioral
study: Higher curiosity in an initial session was correlated
with better recall of surprising answers 1 to 2 weeks later
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