Experimental and empirical evidence shows that the utility an individual derives from a certain state depends on the reference state she compares it to. According to economic theory, the reference state is determined by past, present and future outcomes of either the individual herself or her...

Three results emerge from a simple experiment on imitation. First, I find behavior which strongly suggests an intention to imitate. Second, players imitate successful other players rather than repeating successful actions. Third, to find imitation examples, players use several periods of memory....

The higher our aspirations, the higher the probability that we have to adjust them downwards when forming more realistic expectations later on. This paper shows that the costs induced by high aspirations are not trivial. We first develop a theoretical framework to identify the factors that...

Three results emerge from a simple experiment on imitation. First, I find behavior which strongly suggests an intention to imitate. Second, players imitate successful other players rather than repeating successful actions. Third, to find imitation examples, players use several periods of memory....

In experimental economics there exists a lively debate about the independenceof observations. Although opinions on the issue dier widely, allconcerns regard the independence of subjects' behavior within one sessionor experiment. This paper attempts to shed some light on the independenceof...

We investigate to what extent genuine social preferences can explain observed other-regarding behavior. In a social dilemma situation (a dictator game variant), people can choose whether to learn about the consequences of their choice for the receiver. We find that a majority of the people that...

The higher our aspirations, the higher the probability that we have to adjust them downwards when forming more realistic expectations later on. This paper shows that the costs induced by high aspirations are not trivial. We first develop a theoretical framework to identify the factors that...

Recent research has cast some doubt on the general validity of outcome-based models of social preferences. We develop a model based on cognitive dissonance that focuses on the importance of self-image. An experiment (a dictator game variant) tests the model. First, we find that subjects whose...