The belief that market transactions are mutually beneficial: A comparison of the views of students in economics and other disciplines

Using a survey of a large group of first and final year students of different disciplines to study their belief in the existence of mutual benefits of market transactions, we observe significant differences between economics and business students on the one hand, and, on the other hand, students of other disciplines. These differences increase over time, due partly to economics students increasingly supporting the belief and partly to other students, in particular psychology students, increasingly disagreeing with it. The beliefs of economics students are more homogeneous at the end of their studies. We, therefore, report evidence of both a selection effect and an effect of studying different disciplines that goes beyond initial self-selection.