Who never tells a lie?

A-Tier
Journal: Experimental Economics
Year: 2017
Volume: 20
Issue: 2
Pages: 448-459

Score contribution per author:

4.022 = (α=2.01 / 1 authors) × 2.0x A-tier

α: calibrated so average coauthorship-adjusted count equals average raw count

Abstract

Abstract I experimentally investigate the hypothesis that many people avoid lying even in a situation where doing so would result in a Pareto improvement. Replicating (Erat and Gneezy, Management Science 58, 723–733, 2012), I find that a significant fraction of subjects tell the truth in a sender-receiver game where both subjects earn a higher payoff when the partner makes an incorrect guess regarding the roll of a die. However, a non-incentivized questionnaire indicates that the vast majority of these subjects expected their partner not to follow their message. I conduct two new experiments explicitly designed to test for a ‘pure’ aversion to lying, and find no evidence for the existence of such a motivation. I discuss the implications of the findings for moral behavior and rule following more generally.

Technical Details

RePEc Handle
repec:kap:expeco:v:20:y:2017:i:2:d:10.1007_s10683-016-9491-2
Journal Field
Experimental
Author Count
1
Added to Database
2026-01-29