CeDEx workshop - Yuan Ju (University of York)

Do as you would be done by? – An experimental study of the Golden Rule

Abstract

This paper reports an experimental test of whether people accept to be treated in the same way they treat others, which we call role-reversal consistency. In the experiment, subjects play both roles of a modified version of the standard ultimatum game. We find that over three quarters of the subjects in the experiment are role-reversal consistent. Futhermore, we find a higher level of role-reversal consistency in a treatment where each subject gets to know either if others accept the way she treats them or how others treat her before playing the reverse role, than in a treatment where such information is unavailable. We also find that role-reversal consistent subjects are more accurate predictors of whether others accept the way they treat them and earn more money than role-reversal inconsistent subjects