In this paper, we propose a new channel of contract design to boost efficiency. If deviating from one's own words induces a self-imposed moral burden, the optimal contracting procedure with regard to cheap talk shall assign the responsibility for installing the nonbinding promise in the contract...

We test a mechanism whereby groups are formed voluntarily, through the use of voting. These groups play a public-goods game, where efficiency increases with group size (up to a limit, in one treatment). It is feasible to exclude group members, to exit one's group, or to form larger groups...

Recently, there has been a Renaissance for multi-level selection models to explain the persistence of unselfish behavior in social dilemmas, in which assortative/correlated matching plays an important role. In the current study of a multi-round prisoners’ dilemma experiment, we introduce...

In this paper, the strategy method's impact on behavior in sequential bargaining games is investigated. Besides the decision procedure (hot versus cold), we varied the second mover punishment costs (high versus low). Significant impacts of both treatment variables were observed. For example,...

Politics can involve a movement from a position off the Pareto frontier to a point on it (a positive-sum game as exemplified in the classic [Buchanan, J.M., Tullock, G., 1962. The Calculus of Consent. University of Michigan Press, Ann Arbor] work), or a movement along the Pareto frontier (a...