When and Why Individuals Obey Contracts: Experimental Evidence of Consent, Compliance, Promise, and Performance

Eigen, Zev J.

doi:10.1086/664688

Cited by 19 publications

(14 citation statements)

References 21 publications

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“…One implication of our results is that promisors can create commitment by explicitly encouraging and inviting the creation of expectations (e.g., through advertisement, or through explicit contractual terms displacing background legal defaults) and that, ex post, promisees should make their expectations salient in order to encourage promisors to keep their promises, especially in situations where other incentives to perform a contract are muted. For example, Eigen (2012) argues that an e¤ective way to assure compliance is to remind a contracting party that he has made a promise when entering into a contract. Common law also tracks our account of conditional guilt aversion.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Promises and expectations

Ederer

Stremitzer²

2017

Games and Economic Behavior

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We investigate why people keep their promises in the absence of external enforcement mechanisms and reputational e¤ects. In a controlled laboratory experiment we show that exogenous variation of second-order expectations (promisors' expectations about promisees'expectations) leads to a signi…cant change in promisor behavior. We provide evidence that a promisor's aversion to disappointing a promisee's expectation leads her to behave more generously. We propose and estimate a simple model of conditional guilt aversion that is supported by our results and nests the …ndings of previous contributions as special cases.

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Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Promises and expectations

Ederer

Stremitzer²

2017

Games and Economic Behavior

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“…Even with secret balloting (and thus unobservable votes), promises to vote for a particular candidate are perceived to be su¢ ciently strong for vote-buying "candidates to target trustworthy voters who can be trusted to keep their promise"(p. 876). Eigen (2012) shows that reminding a contracting party that when entering into a contract they have made a promise is an e¤ective way to assure compliance.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Promises and Expectations

Ederer

Stremitzer

2013

SSRN Journal

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We investigate why people keep their promises in the absence of external enforcement mechanisms and reputational e¤ects. In a controlled laboratory experiment we show that exogenous variation of second-order expectations (promisors' expectations about promisees' expectations that the promise will be kept) leads to a signi…cant change in promisor behavior. We provide clean evidence that a promisor's aversion to disappoint a promisee's expectation leads her to keep her promise. We propose a simple theory of lexicographic promise keeping that is supported by our results and nests the …ndings of previous contributions as special cases.Keywords: promises, expectations, beliefs, contracts JEL Classi…cation: A13, C91, D03, C72, D64, K12.We thank Mark Greenberg whose insightful comments in ‡uenced the design of our experiment. We are also grateful to

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“…Laypersons believe that a contract is binding once it has been written up and signed, or if it has been fulfilled (Wilkinson-Ryan and Hoffman 2015). If participants had been given the option to opt into a purportedly contractual obligation, they are more likely to fulfil this obligation (Eigen 2012). Closest to our experiment is the study by Eigen and Hoffman (2015).…”

Section: Earlier Findingsmentioning

confidence: 97%

Committing the English and the Continental Way: An Experiment

Engel

Schmelzer

2017

SSRN Journal

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Standard-Nutzungsbedingungen:Die Dokumente auf EconStor dürfen zu eigenen wissenschaftlichen Zwecken und zum Privatgebrauch gespeichert und kopiert werden.Sie dürfen die Dokumente nicht für öffentliche oder kommerzielle Zwecke vervielfältigen, öffentlich ausstellen, öffentlich zugänglich machen, vertreiben oder anderweitig nutzen.Sofern die Verfasser die Dokumente unter Open-Content-Lizenzen (insbesondere CC-Lizenzen) zur Verfügung gestellt haben sollten, gelten abweichend von diesen Nutzungsbedingungen die in der dort genannten Lizenz gewährten Nutzungsrechte. Terms of use: Documents in AbstractOn the doctrinal surface, there is a deep divide between common and continental law when it comes to the origin of contractual obligations. Under continental law, in principle a unilateral promise suffices. Common law by contrast requires consideration. When it comes to deciding cases, the divide is much less pronounced. But for the most part the law does not govern people's lives through adjudication. It matches or molds their moral intuitions. We test these intuitions in the lab. If consideration is required, participants believe that all participants make more ambitious promises. But they themselves make a more cautious promise. These two effects cancel out, so that promises are not more likely to be kept with consideration.JEL: C91, D02, D03, D12, D64, H41, K12

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When and Why Individuals Obey Contracts: Experimental Evidence of Consent, Compliance, Promise, and Performance

Cited by 19 publications

References 21 publications

Promises and expectations

Promises and expectations

Promises and Expectations

Committing the English and the Continental Way: An Experiment

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