Do cheaters in the lab also cheat in the field?

J Potters, Jan Stoop

Research output: Contribution to journalArticleAcademicpeer-review

71 Citations (Scopus)

Abstract

In this paper, we study the correlation between cheating in the lab and cheating in the field. We conduct a laboratory experiment using a variant of the Mind game (Jiang, 2013). Payoffs above a certain threshold are indicative of cheating behavior. Subjects are paid their earnings by bank transfer. A fraction of the subjects is deliberately paid more than their earnings. We send subjects a reminder e-mail stating their earnings and asking them if they have received their payment. We find a significant correlation of 0.31 between cheating in the lab and in the field. Subjects with higher payoffs in the Mind game are also less likely to report the overpayment. Our results speak to the lab-field generalizability of cheating behavior.
Original languageEnglish
Pages (from-to)26-33
Number of pages8
JournalEuropean Economic Review
Volume87
DOIs
Publication statusPublished - 2016

Fingerprint

Dive into the research topics of 'Do cheaters in the lab also cheat in the field?'. Together they form a unique fingerprint.

Cite this