13:30 - 15:10
Location: 225 - Floor 1
Chair/s:
Danièle Christina Hafner
Danièle Christina Hafner - Donations in the Digital Age: Effects of Human-Machine Interaction on Donation Behavior - an Online Experiment
Huan Xie - Delegation and Endowment Heterogeneity in a Threshold Public Goods Game
Andrea Essl - Visibility and Social Approval: How Observers Shape Prosocial Behavior
Anna Bayona - Probability and Magnitude in Public Goods with Gains and Losses
Miguel A. Melendez-Jimenez - The Sharing Paradox
Submission 62
Visibility and Social Approval: How Observers Shape Prosocial Behavior
panel.5-225 - Floor 1-05
Presented by: Andrea Essl
Andrea EsslHana DadicFrauke von Bieberstein
University of Bern
We study how the intensity of observability and the possibility of ex post feedback affect prosocial behavior. In an online experiment, we implement a one-shot dictator game with a passive third-party observer and systematically vary observability: the observer sees only the decision, sees the decision together with a photo of the decision maker, or sees the decision and meets the decision maker in a brief silent live video call after the decision. We further vary whether the observer can provide structured feedback after the decision. We find that making decisions observable increases generosity relative to a dictator game without an observer. Absent feedback, increasing observability intensity from decision visibility to photo or live video does not further affect giving. In contrast, when feedback is possible, observability intensity matters: photo and video exposure combined with feedback significantly increase transfers, with the strongest effects under live video. Decomposition shows that observability without feedback mainly affects the extensive margin of giving, whereas observability with feedback increases both the likelihood of giving and the amount given.