Leading by words : a voluntary contribution experiment with one-way communication

Anastasios Koukoumelis; M. Vittoria Levati; Johannes Weisser

In this paper, we study a voluntary contribution mechanism with one-way communication. The relevance of one person's words is assessed by assigning exogenously the role of the "communicator" to one group member. Contrary to the view that the mutual exchange of promises is necessary for the cooperation-enhancing effect of communication, we find that, compared to a standard voluntary contribution mechanism with no communication, one-way communication significantly increases contributions and renders them stable over time. Moreover, the positive effects of one-way communication persist even when communication is one-shot. -- Public goods experiment ; computer-mediated communication ; Cheap-talk ; Cooperation

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Year of publication:	2009
Authors:	Koukoumelis, Anastasios ; Levati, M. Vittoria ; Weisser, Johannes
Publisher:	Jena : Univ. [u.a.]
Subject:	Öffentliche Güter \| Public goods \| Nichtkooperatives Spiel \| Noncooperative game \| Experiment \| Kommunikation \| Communication \| Computerunterstützung \| Computerized method