Arbeitspapier

Lies and biased evaluation: A real-effort experiment

This paper presents the results of a laboratory experiment in which workers perform a real-effort task and supervisors report the workers' performance to the experimenter. The report is non verifiable and determines the earnings of both the supervisor and the worker. We find that not all the supervisors, but at least one third of them bias their report. Both selfish black lies (increasing the supervisor's earnings while decreasing the worker's payoff) and Pareto white lies (increasing the earnings of both) according to Erat and Gneezy (2009)'s terminology are frequent. In contrast, spiteful black lies (decreasing the earnings of both) and altruistic white lies (increasing the earnings of workers but decreasing those of the supervisor) are almost non-existent. The supervisors' second-order beliefs and their decision to lie are highly correlated, suggesting that guilt aversion plays a role.

Language
Englisch

Bibliographic citation
Series: IZA Discussion Papers ; No. 5884

Classification
Wirtschaft
Design of Experiments: Laboratory, Individual
Asymmetric and Private Information; Mechanism Design
Personnel Economics: Compensation and Compensation Methods and Their Effects
Subject
lies
deception
self-image
guilt aversion
lie-aversion
evaluation
experiments

Event
Geistige Schöpfung
(who)
Rosaz, Julie
Villeval, Marie Claire
Event
Veröffentlichung
(who)
Institute for the Study of Labor (IZA)
(where)
Bonn
(when)
2011

Handle
URN
urn:nbn:de:101:1-201108093149
Last update
10.03.2025, 11:45 AM CET

Data provider

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Object type

  • Arbeitspapier

Associated

  • Rosaz, Julie
  • Villeval, Marie Claire
  • Institute for the Study of Labor (IZA)

Time of origin

  • 2011

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