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Do Negative Emotions Explain Punishment in Power-to-Take Game Experiments?

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  • Fabio Galeotti

    (GATE Lyon Saint-Étienne - Groupe d'Analyse et de Théorie Economique Lyon - Saint-Etienne - ENS de Lyon - École normale supérieure de Lyon - UL2 - Université Lumière - Lyon 2 - UCBL - Université Claude Bernard Lyon 1 - Université de Lyon - UJM - Université Jean Monnet - Saint-Étienne - CNRS - Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique)

Abstract

An important branch of economic research on emotions has used power-to-take game experiments to study the impact of negative emotions, such as anger, irritation and contempt, on the decision to punish. We investigate experimentally the role that the specific punishment technology adopted plays in this context, and test to what extent punishing behavior can be truly attributed to negative emotions. We find that a large part (around 70%) of the punishment behavior observed in previous PTTG studies is explained by the technology of punishment adopted instead of negative emotions. Once this effect is removed, negative emotions do still play an important role, but the efficiency costs associated to them are much smaller.

Suggested Citation

  • Fabio Galeotti, 2015. "Do Negative Emotions Explain Punishment in Power-to-Take Game Experiments?," Working Papers halshs-01128873, HAL.
    • Handle: RePEc:hal:wpaper:halshs-01128873
    Note: View the original document on HAL open archive server: https://shs.hal.science/halshs-01128873
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    Cited by:

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    3. Ronald Bosman & Heike Hennig-Schmidt & Frans Van Winden, 2017. "Emotion at Stake—The Role of Stake Size and Emotions in a Power-to-Take Game Experiment in China with a Comparison to Europe," Games, MDPI, vol. 8(1), pages 1-22, March.
    4. Jiang, Bing & Pan, Xiaofei, 2023. "An anger premium: An experiment on the role of counterpart emotions in coordination," Journal of Behavioral and Experimental Economics (formerly The Journal of Socio-Economics), Elsevier, vol. 103(C).
    5. Mei-Mei Lin, 2016. "What is the Affect by Leader Emotion in an Organization? Exploring the Effects of Leader Emotion on Leader Role and Employee Impression," International Journal of Business and Management, Canadian Center of Science and Education, vol. 12(1), pages 239-239, December.
    6. Eisenkopf, Gerald & Friehe, Tim & Wohlschlegel, Ansgar, 2019. "On the role of emotions in experimental litigation contests," International Review of Law and Economics, Elsevier, vol. 57(C), pages 90-94.
    7. Vranceanu, Radu & Sutan, Angela & Dubart, Delphine, 2016. "Discontent with taxes and the timing of taxation : experimental evidence," ESSEC Working Papers WP1602, ESSEC Research Center, ESSEC Business School.
    8. Farrar, Jonathan & Hausserman, Cass & Rennie, Morina, 2019. "The influence of revenge and financial rewards on tax fraud reporting intentions," Journal of Economic Psychology, Elsevier, vol. 71(C), pages 102-116.
    9. Franziska Heinicke & Wladislaw Mill & Henrik Orzen, 2024. "Bargaining Under the Threat of a Nuclear Option," CRC TR 224 Discussion Paper Series crctr224_2024_559, University of Bonn and University of Mannheim, Germany.

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    More about this item

    Keywords

    Emotions; punish ment; power-to-take; experiment;
    All these keywords.

    JEL classification:

    • A12 - General Economics and Teaching - - General Economics - - - Relation of Economics to Other Disciplines
    • C72 - Mathematical and Quantitative Methods - - Game Theory and Bargaining Theory - - - Noncooperative Games
    • C91 - Mathematical and Quantitative Methods - - Design of Experiments - - - Laboratory, Individual Behavior

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