Interregional diversity of fairness concerns: an online ultimatum experiment

Does geographic distance or the perceived social distance between subjects significantly affect proposer and responder behavior in ultimatum bargaining? To answer this question, subjects play a one-shot ultimatum game with three players (proposer, responder, and a passive dummy player) and asymmetric information (only the proposer knows what can be distributed). Treatments differ in their geographic scope by involving either one or three different locations in Germany. Observed behavior reflects the robust stylized facts of this class of ultimatum experiments and can be adequately explained by other-regarding preferences. While responder behavior does not condition on co-players' location of residence, self-interest of proposers varies significantly with the latter. Altogether, we do not detect strong discrimination based on geographic distance.