Projective Paternalism

Ambuehl, Sandro; Bernheim, B. Douglas; Ockenfels, Axel

doi:10.3386/w26119

“…This is an important finding in that such norm-nudges are commonly employed, and it can explain why they remain ineffective at times, as discussed above. This finding is also consistent with recent experimental and theoretical evidence suggesting that behavior can be sticky and requires a less gentle 'shove' or an active behavioral intervention (e.g., Kahan, 2000;Grüne-Yanoff and Hertwig, 2016, see also Ambuehl et al, 2019).…”

Section: Introductionsupporting

confidence: 91%

Requiem for a Nudge: Framing effects in nudging honesty

Dimant

¹

,

Kleef

²

,

Shalvi

³

2020

Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization

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We examine framing effects in nudging honesty, in the spirit of the growing norm-nudge literature, by utilizing a high-powered and pre-registered study. Across four treatments, participants received one random truthful norm-nudge that emphasized 'moral suasion' based on either what other participants previously did (empirical message) or approved of doing (normative message) and varied in the framing (positive or negative) in which it was presented. Subsequently, participants repeatedly played the 'mind game' in which they were first asked to think of a number, then rolled a digital die, and then reported whether the two numbers coincide, in which case a bonus was paid. Hence, whether or not the report was truthful remained unobservable to the experimenters. We find compelling null effects with tight confidence intervals showing that none of the norm-nudge interventions worked. A follow-up experiment reveals the reason for these convincing null-effects: the information norm-nudges did not actually change norms. Notably, our secondary results suggest that a substantial portion of individuals misremembered norm-nudges such that they conveniently supported deviant behavior. This subset of participants indeed displayed significantly higher deviance levels, a behavior pattern in line with literature on motivated misremembering and belief distortion. We discuss the importance of this high-powered null finding for the flourishing norm-nudge literature and derive policy implications. JEL-Codes: B410, D010, D900.

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“…This is an important finding in that such norm-nudges are commonly employed, and it can explain why they remain ineffective at times, as discussed above. This finding is also consistent with recent experimental and theoretical evidence suggesting that behavior can be sticky and requires a less gentle 'shove' or an active behavioral intervention (e.g., Kahan, 2000; Grüne-Yanoff and Hertwig, 2016, see also Ambuehl et al, 2019).…”

Section: Introductionsupporting

confidence: 90%

Requiem for a Nudge: Framing Effects in Nudging Honesty

Dimant

¹

,

Kleef

²

,

Shalvi

³

2019

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

We examine framing effects in nudging honesty, in the spirit of the growing norm-nudge literature, by utilizing a high-powered and pre-registered study. Across four treatments, participants received one random truthful norm-nudge that emphasized 'moral suasion' based on either what other participants previously did (empirical message) or approved of doing (normative message) and varied in the framing (positive or negative) in which it was presented. Subsequently, participants repeatedly played the 'mind game' in which they were first asked to think of a number, then rolled a digital die, and then reported whether the two numbers coincide, in which case a bonus was paid. Hence, whether or not the report was truthful remained unobservable to the experimenters. We find compelling null effects with tight confidence intervals showing that none of the norm-nudge interventions worked. A follow-up experiment reveals the reason for these convincing null-effects: the information norm-nudges did not actually change norms. Notably, our secondary results suggest that a substantial portion of individuals misremembered norm-nudges such that they conveniently supported deviant behavior. This subset of participants indeed displayed significantly higher deviance levels, a behavior pattern in line with literature on motivated misremembering and belief distortion. We discuss the importance of this high-powered null finding for the flourishing norm-nudge literature and derive policy implications.

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“…For instance, buying and selling kidneys for transplantation or trading school and university admission is illegal in most countries (Roth 2007). Thus, a stream of recent studies is concerned with understanding the empirical nature and robustness of such constraints to reconcile ethical concerns with economic effectiveness (Leider and Roth 2010;Ambuehl et al 2015Ambuehl et al , 2019aKirchler et al 2016;Ambuehl 2017).…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Market Design, Human Behavior, and Management

Cao

¹

,

Cramton

²

,

List

³

et al. 2021

Self Cite

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We review past research and discuss future directions on how the vibrant research areas of market design and behavioral economics have influenced and will continue to impact the science and practice of management in both the private and public sectors. Using examples from various auction markets, reputation and feedback systems in online markets, matching markets in education, and labor markets, we demonstrate that combining market design theory, behavioral insights, and experimental methods can lead to fruitful implementation of superior market designs in practice. This paper was accepted by David Simchi-Levi, Special Issue of Management Science: 65th Anniversary.

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Projective Paternalism

Cited by 14 publications

References 51 publications

Requiem for a Nudge: Framing effects in nudging honesty

Requiem for a Nudge: Framing effects in nudging honesty

Requiem for a Nudge: Framing Effects in Nudging Honesty

Market Design, Human Behavior, and Management

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