Self-nudging is more ethical, but less efficient than social nudging

Konferenzbeitrag

Manipulating choice architectures to achieve social ends ('social nudges') raises problems of ethicality. Giving individuals control over their default choice ('selfnudges') is a possible remedy, but the trade-offs with efficiency are poorly understood. We examine under four different information structures how subjects set own defaults in social dilemmas and whether outcomes differ between the self-nudge and two exogenous defaults, a social (full cooperation) and a selfish (perfect free-riding) nudge. Subjects recruited from the general population (n = 1,080) play a ten-round, ten-day voluntary contribution mechanism online, with defaults triggered by the absence of an active contribution on the day. We find that individuals' own choice of defaults structurally differs from full cooperation, empirically affirming the ethicality problem of social nudges. Allowing for self-nudges instead of social nudges reduces efficiency at the group level, however. When individual control over nudges is non-negotiable, self-nudges need to be made public to minimize the ethicality-efficiency trade-off.

Object Details

• Language: Englisch

References and Relationships

• Bibliographic citation: Series: Beiträge zur Jahrestagung des Vereins für Socialpolitik 2023: Growth and the "sociale Frage"

Classification and Topics

• Classification: Wirtschaft ; Public Goods ; Design of Experiments: Laboratory, Group Behavior ; Micro-Based Behavioral Economics: Role and Effects of Psychological, Emotional, Social, and Cognitive Factors on Decision Making‡
• Subject: Choice architecture ; defaults ; public goods ; self-nudge ; online experiment

Contributors, Places and Time

• Event: Geistige Schöpfung
• (who): Diederich, Johannes ; Goeschl, Timo ; Waichman, Israel
• Event: Veröffentlichung
• (who): ZBW - Leibniz Information Centre for Economics
• (where): Kiel, Hamburg
• (when): 2023

Further information

• Handle: http://hdl.handle.net/10419/277679
• Last update: 10.03.2025, 11:44 AM CET