Standardized classroom economics experiments provide a treasure trove of evidence about how well results reproduce when nearly-identical methods are used. We use a sample of around 20,000 observations to test reproducibility in bargaining and trading. Ultimatum bargaining exhibits some geographical variation, and shows that equal split offers are accepted more often and more quickly than slightly unequal offers. Double auction results are highly reproducible and are close to equilibrium predictions. Our large sample shows robust, strong correlations between how individual surplus and trading order, and autocorrelation (0.5) of successive price changes, consistent with trading dynamics based on limited rationality.
We demonstrate the possibility of conducting synchronous, repeated, multi-game economic decision-making experiments with hundreds of subjects in-person or remotely with live streaming using entirely mobile platforms. Our experiment provides important proof-of-concept that such experiments are not only possible, but yield recognizable results as well as new insights, blurring the line between laboratory and field experiments. Specifically, our findings from 8 different experimental economics games and tasks replicate existing results from traditional laboratory experiments despite the fact that subjects play those games/task in a specific order and regardless of whether the experiment was conducted in person or remotely. We further leverage our large subject population to study the effect of large (N = 100) versus small (N = 10) group sizes on behavior in three of the scalable games that we study. While our results are largely consistent with existing findings for small groups, increases in group size are shown to matter for the robustness of those findings.
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