Pub Date : 2026-04-01Epub Date: 2026-02-11DOI: 10.1016/j.jebo.2026.107459
Svetlana Pashchenko , Ponpoje Porapakkarm
Three key drivers of savings are life-cycle, precautionary, and bequest motives. What is their relative quantitative importance? We revisit this question focusing on the role of preferences and institutions. We address the challenge of disentangling the effects of different saving motives on one’s decisions by considering many aspects of people’s behavior both before and after retirement. We illustrate why this approach is informative about the underlying preference parameters, and hence allows us to uncover the relative strength of different motives. Our decomposition exercises reveal that the bequest motive is the key driver of savings starting from middle-age and long before retirement. We also find that the life-cycle motive and the precautionary motive due to medical expense shocks play a minor role. The former result is due to the crowding out effect of Social Security. The latter is due to the combined effect of health insurance and the means-tested transfers.
{"title":"Saving motives over the life-cycle","authors":"Svetlana Pashchenko , Ponpoje Porapakkarm","doi":"10.1016/j.jebo.2026.107459","DOIUrl":"10.1016/j.jebo.2026.107459","url":null,"abstract":"<div><div>Three key drivers of savings are life-cycle, precautionary, and bequest motives. What is their relative quantitative importance? We revisit this question focusing on the role of preferences and institutions. We address the challenge of disentangling the effects of different saving motives on one’s decisions by considering many aspects of people’s behavior both before and after retirement. We illustrate why this approach is informative about the underlying preference parameters, and hence allows us to uncover the relative strength of different motives. Our decomposition exercises reveal that the bequest motive is the key driver of savings starting from middle-age and long before retirement. We also find that the life-cycle motive and the precautionary motive due to medical expense shocks play a minor role. The former result is due to the crowding out effect of Social Security. The latter is due to the combined effect of health insurance and the means-tested transfers.</div></div>","PeriodicalId":48409,"journal":{"name":"Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization","volume":"244 ","pages":"Article 107459"},"PeriodicalIF":2.3,"publicationDate":"2026-04-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"146193119","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":3,"RegionCategory":"经济学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2026-04-01Epub Date: 2026-02-12DOI: 10.1016/j.jebo.2026.107440
Chen Sun
We propose a simple and practical method for measuring intertemporal preferences. The method operates without requiring knowledge of discount or utility functions. Unlike previous parameter-free methods confined to discounted utility models, it accommodates a broad class of preferences. For parametric estimation or revealed preference tests, the method also allows for non-convex or non-separable preferences. Moreover, it is transparently incentive compatible. We demonstrate its application in an experiment, testing behavioral hypotheses from recent non-discounted utility models without fully specifying functional forms.
{"title":"Measuring preferences over temporal profiles✰","authors":"Chen Sun","doi":"10.1016/j.jebo.2026.107440","DOIUrl":"10.1016/j.jebo.2026.107440","url":null,"abstract":"<div><div>We propose a simple and practical method for measuring intertemporal preferences. The method operates without requiring knowledge of discount or utility functions. Unlike previous parameter-free methods confined to discounted utility models, it accommodates a broad class of preferences. For parametric estimation or revealed preference tests, the method also allows for non-convex or non-separable preferences. Moreover, it is transparently incentive compatible. We demonstrate its application in an experiment, testing behavioral hypotheses from recent non-discounted utility models without fully specifying functional forms.</div></div>","PeriodicalId":48409,"journal":{"name":"Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization","volume":"244 ","pages":"Article 107440"},"PeriodicalIF":2.3,"publicationDate":"2026-04-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"146193121","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":3,"RegionCategory":"经济学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2026-04-01Epub Date: 2026-02-10DOI: 10.1016/j.jebo.2026.107469
Francesco Bogliacino , Leonardo Pejsachowicz , Giovanni Liva , Francisco Lupiáñez-Villanueva
This article introduces the transaction test, a novel experimental method to detect whether a website customization can be deceptive. The method measures changes in choice inconsistency with respect to a plain design. In a highly powered online experiment, we assess three dark patterns and one transparency-based remedy in decisions involving data protection. Compared to a placebo condition, dark patterns increase the likelihood of choice inconsistency by an effect in the range of 6-12 percentage points, depending on experimental conditions. The transparency-based remedy fails to mitigate these effects. A second study implements the transaction test in a market experiment. Here, one of the treatments from the online experiment increases inconsistency by 42 pp. Two additional deceptive designs are tested, respectively favoring consistent and inconsistent choices. The Dark Pattern version raises inconsistency by 18 pp while the Bright Pattern reduces it by 15 pp. Our findings demonstrate how the transaction test, by providing an empirical assessment of the legal concept of unfairness, offers a flexible tool for the regulation of dark patterns and other commercial practices.
{"title":"The transaction test: An experimental method for assessing online interfaces","authors":"Francesco Bogliacino , Leonardo Pejsachowicz , Giovanni Liva , Francisco Lupiáñez-Villanueva","doi":"10.1016/j.jebo.2026.107469","DOIUrl":"10.1016/j.jebo.2026.107469","url":null,"abstract":"<div><div>This article introduces the <em>transaction test</em>, a novel experimental method to detect whether a website customization can be deceptive. The method measures changes in choice inconsistency with respect to a plain design. In a highly powered online experiment, we assess three dark patterns and one transparency-based remedy in decisions involving data protection. Compared to a placebo condition, dark patterns increase the likelihood of choice inconsistency by an effect in the range of 6-12 percentage points, depending on experimental conditions. The transparency-based remedy fails to mitigate these effects. A second study implements the transaction test in a market experiment. Here, one of the treatments from the online experiment increases inconsistency by 42 pp. Two additional deceptive designs are tested, respectively favoring consistent and inconsistent choices. The Dark Pattern version raises inconsistency by 18 pp while the Bright Pattern reduces it by 15 pp. Our findings demonstrate how the transaction test, by providing an empirical assessment of the legal concept of unfairness, offers a flexible tool for the regulation of dark patterns and other commercial practices.</div></div>","PeriodicalId":48409,"journal":{"name":"Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization","volume":"244 ","pages":"Article 107469"},"PeriodicalIF":2.3,"publicationDate":"2026-04-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"146147667","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":3,"RegionCategory":"经济学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2026-04-01Epub Date: 2026-02-12DOI: 10.1016/j.jebo.2026.107468
Cass R. Sunstein
The outpouring of empirical work on how and when human beings depart from perfect rationality has led to a wholesale rethinking of paternalism and its limits. Over the last decades, three camps have emerged: (1) coercive paternalists, who urge that behavioral findings undermine John Stuart Mill's Harm Principle and greatly strengthen arguments for paternalistic mandates and bans; (2) libertarian paternalists, who urge that behavioral findings justify a host of paternalistic but freedom-preserving interventions or "nudges," such as warnings, reminders, labels, and automatic enrollment; and (3) antipaternalists, who urge that behavioral findings do not justify paternalism and argue only, or at most, for efforts to strengthen or "boost" people's competences, or their capacities to make good choices. On welfare grounds, it is possible to identify the assumptions under which, and the policy domains in which, one or another approach would be best. Libertarian paternalism often has significant advantages over coercive paternalism, at least in circumstances in which choosers are heterogeneous. But when all or most choosers err, the welfarist argument for coercive paternalism is strengthened, and when choosers are not only heterogeneous but also adequately informed and free from behavioral biases, antipaternalism makes a great deal of sense.
{"title":"Paternalism after behavioral economics","authors":"Cass R. Sunstein","doi":"10.1016/j.jebo.2026.107468","DOIUrl":"10.1016/j.jebo.2026.107468","url":null,"abstract":"<div><div>The outpouring of empirical work on how and when human beings depart from perfect rationality has led to a wholesale rethinking of paternalism and its limits. Over the last decades, three camps have emerged: (1) <em>coercive paternalists</em>, who urge that behavioral findings undermine John Stuart Mill's Harm Principle and greatly strengthen arguments for paternalistic mandates and bans; (2) <em>libertarian paternalists</em>, who urge that behavioral findings justify a host of paternalistic but freedom-preserving interventions or \"nudges,\" such as warnings, reminders, labels, and automatic enrollment; and (3) <em>antipaternalists</em>, who urge that behavioral findings do not justify paternalism and argue only, or at most, for efforts to strengthen or \"boost\" people's competences, or their capacities to make good choices. On welfare grounds, it is possible to identify the assumptions under which, and the policy domains in which, one or another approach would be best. Libertarian paternalism often has significant advantages over coercive paternalism, at least in circumstances in which choosers are heterogeneous. But when all or most choosers err, the welfarist argument for coercive paternalism is strengthened, and when choosers are not only heterogeneous but also adequately informed and free from behavioral biases, antipaternalism makes a great deal of sense.</div></div>","PeriodicalId":48409,"journal":{"name":"Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization","volume":"244 ","pages":"Article 107468"},"PeriodicalIF":2.3,"publicationDate":"2026-04-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"146193116","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":3,"RegionCategory":"经济学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2026-04-01Epub Date: 2026-02-09DOI: 10.1016/j.jebo.2026.107456
R. Emre Aytimur , Daiki Kishishita
To explore the recent surge of fringe candidates, we investigate the dynamic interplay between social norms and elections. We use a two-period electoral competition model featuring a mainstream and fringe candidate, where voting for the fringe candidate incurs stigma due to her extreme views that contravene prevailing social norms. A significant first-period vote for the fringe candidate signals wider acceptance, eroding norms and boosting her second-period success. To achieve this, the fringe candidate diverges on standard policy issues, while the mainstream candidate imitates her. Paradoxically, heightened initial social norms may enhance the fringe candidate’s subsequent election success.
{"title":"Social norms and the rise of fringe candidates","authors":"R. Emre Aytimur , Daiki Kishishita","doi":"10.1016/j.jebo.2026.107456","DOIUrl":"10.1016/j.jebo.2026.107456","url":null,"abstract":"<div><div>To explore the recent surge of fringe candidates, we investigate the dynamic interplay between social norms and elections. We use a two-period electoral competition model featuring a mainstream and fringe candidate, where voting for the fringe candidate incurs stigma due to her extreme views that contravene prevailing social norms. A significant first-period vote for the fringe candidate signals wider acceptance, eroding norms and boosting her second-period success. To achieve this, the fringe candidate diverges on standard policy issues, while the mainstream candidate imitates her. Paradoxically, heightened initial social norms may enhance the fringe candidate’s subsequent election success.</div></div>","PeriodicalId":48409,"journal":{"name":"Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization","volume":"244 ","pages":"Article 107456"},"PeriodicalIF":2.3,"publicationDate":"2026-04-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"146147665","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":3,"RegionCategory":"经济学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2026-04-01Epub Date: 2026-02-09DOI: 10.1016/j.jebo.2025.107333
Guidon Fenig , Luba Petersen
This paper explores sources of complexity in dynamic optimization, examining how individuals navigate variation in incomes, prices, and returns in ten-period consumption-saving decisions. Our findings reveal that dynamic optimization poses significant challenges, resulting in suboptimal choices even in straightforward scenarios with stable parameters, full information, no uncertainty, and opportunities to learn. These challenges intensify in scenarios involving complexities such as frequent price changes and compounding returns, characterized by a pronounced tendency to over-smooth consumption. Additionally, we introduce a novel budgeting calculator aimed to assist with consumption planning and to collect valuable non-choice data on subjects’ planning strategies and horizons-an approach not previously utilized in studies of dynamic optimization. Participants’ actual planning horizons tend to be longer than their consumption decisions would imply. Complete planning leads to better performance in more complex scenarios, even when people do not optimally utilize the calculator. However, there is little reoptimization after the first period and participants tend to stick with suboptimal plans for most of their life cycle. The decision to plan is less influenced by the complexity of the economic environment and more by the length of the planning horizon.
{"title":"Dynamic optimization meets budgeting: Unraveling financial complexities","authors":"Guidon Fenig , Luba Petersen","doi":"10.1016/j.jebo.2025.107333","DOIUrl":"10.1016/j.jebo.2025.107333","url":null,"abstract":"<div><div>This paper explores sources of complexity in dynamic optimization, examining how individuals navigate variation in incomes, prices, and returns in ten-period consumption-saving decisions. Our findings reveal that dynamic optimization poses significant challenges, resulting in suboptimal choices even in straightforward scenarios with stable parameters, full information, no uncertainty, and opportunities to learn. These challenges intensify in scenarios involving complexities such as frequent price changes and compounding returns, characterized by a pronounced tendency to over-smooth consumption. Additionally, we introduce a novel budgeting calculator aimed to assist with consumption planning and to collect valuable non-choice data on subjects’ planning strategies and horizons-an approach not previously utilized in studies of dynamic optimization. Participants’ actual planning horizons tend to be longer than their consumption decisions would imply. Complete planning leads to better performance in more complex scenarios, even when people do not optimally utilize the calculator. However, there is little reoptimization after the first period and participants tend to stick with suboptimal plans for most of their life cycle. The decision to plan is less influenced by the complexity of the economic environment and more by the length of the planning horizon.</div></div>","PeriodicalId":48409,"journal":{"name":"Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization","volume":"244 ","pages":"Article 107333"},"PeriodicalIF":2.3,"publicationDate":"2026-04-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"146147666","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":3,"RegionCategory":"经济学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2026-04-01Epub Date: 2026-02-13DOI: 10.1016/j.jebo.2026.107457
Seiya Hirano
In the adoption decisions of network goods, coordination problems lead to multiple equilibria. While consumer coordination significantly impacts the firm’s pricing strategies, the precise relationship between coordination behavior and optimal pricing has received little attention. This paper analyzes optimal pricing strategies for network goods under different forms of coordination by strategic consumers in a two-period model. We introduce two novel coordination criteria: risk dominance and threshold coordination. Risk dominance coordination accounts for the risk of a coordination failure, and threshold coordination reflects consumer heterogeneity in the valuation of the good. We show that under the risk dominance criterion, the firm sets a lower price in period 1 when the risk of a coordination failure is high, but sets a higher price in period 1 when the risk is low and the proportion of early adopters is large. Under threshold coordination, the firm sets a lower price in period 1 when consumers hold pessimistic beliefs about the network size and sets a higher price in period 1 when beliefs are optimistic. Our findings highlight the critical implications of consumer coordination for firms’ pricing strategies.
{"title":"Consumer coordination and optimal pricing under network externalities","authors":"Seiya Hirano","doi":"10.1016/j.jebo.2026.107457","DOIUrl":"10.1016/j.jebo.2026.107457","url":null,"abstract":"<div><div>In the adoption decisions of network goods, coordination problems lead to multiple equilibria. While consumer coordination significantly impacts the firm’s pricing strategies, the precise relationship between coordination behavior and optimal pricing has received little attention. This paper analyzes optimal pricing strategies for network goods under different forms of coordination by strategic consumers in a two-period model. We introduce two novel coordination criteria: risk dominance and threshold coordination. Risk dominance coordination accounts for the risk of a coordination failure, and threshold coordination reflects consumer heterogeneity in the valuation of the good. We show that under the risk dominance criterion, the firm sets a lower price in period 1 when the risk of a coordination failure is high, but sets a higher price in period 1 when the risk is low and the proportion of early adopters is large. Under threshold coordination, the firm sets a lower price in period 1 when consumers hold pessimistic beliefs about the network size and sets a higher price in period 1 when beliefs are optimistic. Our findings highlight the critical implications of consumer coordination for firms’ pricing strategies.</div></div>","PeriodicalId":48409,"journal":{"name":"Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization","volume":"244 ","pages":"Article 107457"},"PeriodicalIF":2.3,"publicationDate":"2026-04-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"146193117","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":3,"RegionCategory":"经济学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2026-04-01Epub Date: 2026-02-12DOI: 10.1016/j.jebo.2026.107437
Joscha Beckmann , Jennifer Brunne , Timo Heinrich
This paper provides a new perspective on the formation of inflation expectations based on a sample of 1036 US residents. In our information provision experiment, the participants were provided with professional forecasts of different historical accuracy and complexity. Our novel experimental design allows us to assess the influence of cognitive uncertainty while controlling for the uncertainty associated with forecasts and priors. Consistent with cognitive uncertainty we find that more complex forecasts lead to smaller updates of inflation expectation.
{"title":"Inflation expectations and cognitive uncertainty","authors":"Joscha Beckmann , Jennifer Brunne , Timo Heinrich","doi":"10.1016/j.jebo.2026.107437","DOIUrl":"10.1016/j.jebo.2026.107437","url":null,"abstract":"<div><div>This paper provides a new perspective on the formation of inflation expectations based on a sample of 1036 US residents. In our information provision experiment, the participants were provided with professional forecasts of different historical accuracy and complexity. Our novel experimental design allows us to assess the influence of cognitive uncertainty while controlling for the uncertainty associated with forecasts and priors. Consistent with cognitive uncertainty we find that more complex forecasts lead to smaller updates of inflation expectation.</div></div>","PeriodicalId":48409,"journal":{"name":"Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization","volume":"244 ","pages":"Article 107437"},"PeriodicalIF":2.3,"publicationDate":"2026-04-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"146193120","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":3,"RegionCategory":"经济学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2026-03-01Epub Date: 2026-01-24DOI: 10.1016/j.jebo.2026.107435
Scott Abrahams
I examine decision-making across a gradient of time horizons using data from competitive powerlifting, where participants must assess their physical abilities under varying time constraints. Analyzing one million choice sequences in this natural, high-stakes setting, I document systematic gender differences that vary by horizon and feedback direction. Over horizons of thirty minutes to several hours, men consistently overestimate their abilities, failing initial attempts at all three types of lifts, and they are less likely to update sufficiently across lift types following the negative signal of an earlier miss. Under extreme time pressure requiring a decision within one minute, the performance gap shrinks and men are more likely to make beneficial deviations from established guidance. This differential rapid evaluation of the signal content in negative feedback suggests a novel explanatory mechanism for observed gender variation in performance under time pressure.
{"title":"Gender differences in choosing fast and slow: Evidence from competitive powerlifting","authors":"Scott Abrahams","doi":"10.1016/j.jebo.2026.107435","DOIUrl":"10.1016/j.jebo.2026.107435","url":null,"abstract":"<div><div>I examine decision-making across a gradient of time horizons using data from competitive powerlifting, where participants must assess their physical abilities under varying time constraints. Analyzing one million choice sequences in this natural, high-stakes setting, I document systematic gender differences that vary by horizon and feedback direction. Over horizons of thirty minutes to several hours, men consistently overestimate their abilities, failing initial attempts at all three types of lifts, and they are less likely to update sufficiently across lift types following the negative signal of an earlier miss. Under extreme time pressure requiring a decision within one minute, the performance gap shrinks and men are more likely to make beneficial deviations from established guidance. This differential rapid evaluation of the signal content in negative feedback suggests a novel explanatory mechanism for observed gender variation in performance under time pressure.</div></div>","PeriodicalId":48409,"journal":{"name":"Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization","volume":"243 ","pages":"Article 107435"},"PeriodicalIF":2.3,"publicationDate":"2026-03-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"146025750","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":3,"RegionCategory":"经济学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2026-03-01Epub Date: 2026-01-29DOI: 10.1016/j.jebo.2026.107441
Lawrence Choo , Zhen Lei , Wei Tang
We conduct an experiment to examine how karmic reasoning—the belief that good deeds lead to favourable outcomes—affects belief formation in unrelated chance events. We motivate our design by observations from the China Family Panel Studies, which show that respondents who donated in the past 12 months are more likely to make risky choices. To investigate this further, we design a controlled laboratory experiment to evaluate the impact of real charitable donations on subjects’ beliefs about winning an even-chance lottery. Our results reveal that beliefs about winning increase with the amount donated, but this effect is significant only among those who voluntarily donated and more sensitive to karmic beliefs. This study underscores the role of karmic reasoning in shaping beliefs, contributing to the broader understanding of wishful thinking and motivated beliefs.
{"title":"Motivated by karma","authors":"Lawrence Choo , Zhen Lei , Wei Tang","doi":"10.1016/j.jebo.2026.107441","DOIUrl":"10.1016/j.jebo.2026.107441","url":null,"abstract":"<div><div>We conduct an experiment to examine how karmic reasoning—the belief that good deeds lead to favourable outcomes—affects belief formation in unrelated chance events. We motivate our design by observations from the China Family Panel Studies, which show that respondents who donated in the past 12 months are more likely to make risky choices. To investigate this further, we design a controlled laboratory experiment to evaluate the impact of real charitable donations on subjects’ beliefs about winning an even-chance lottery. Our results reveal that beliefs about winning increase with the amount donated, but this effect is significant only among those who voluntarily donated and more sensitive to karmic beliefs. This study underscores the role of karmic reasoning in shaping beliefs, contributing to the broader understanding of wishful thinking and motivated beliefs.</div></div>","PeriodicalId":48409,"journal":{"name":"Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization","volume":"243 ","pages":"Article 107441"},"PeriodicalIF":2.3,"publicationDate":"2026-03-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"146080828","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":3,"RegionCategory":"经济学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
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