Browsing by Author "Brekke, Kjell Arne"

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    Are Social Preferences Skin Deep? Dictators under Cognitive Load
    (2009-07-03T06:31:24Z) Hauge, Karen Evelyn; Brekke, Kjell Arne; Johansson, Lars-Olof; Johansson-Stenman, Olof; Svedsäter, Henrik
    We study the impact of cognitive load in dictator games to test two conflicting views of moral behavior. Are social preferences skin‐deep in the sense that they are the result of humans’ cognitive reasoning while the natural instinct is selfish, or is rather the natural instinct to share fairly while our cognitive capacities are able to adjust moral principles in a self‐serving manner? Some previous studies in more complex settings give conflicting answers, and to disentangle different possible mechanisms we use simple games. We study both charitable giving and the behavior of dictators under high and low cognitive load, where high cognitive load is assumed to reduce the impact of cognitive processes on behavior. In the dictator game we use both a give frame, where the dictator is given an amount and may share some or all of it to a partner, and a take frame, where dictators may take from an amount initially allocated to the partner. The results from four different studies indicate that the effect of cognitive load is small if at all existing.
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    The Behavioural Economics of Climate Change
    (2008-05-19T13:42:04Z) Brekke, Kjell Arne; Johansson-Stenman, Olof
    This paper attempts to bring some central insights from behavioural economics into the economics of climate change. In particular, it discusses (i) implications of prospect theory, the equity premium puzzle and time inconsistent preferences in the choice of discount rate used in climate change cost assessments, and (ii) the implications of various kinds of social preferences for the outcome of climate negotiations. Several reasons are presented for why it appears advisable to choose a substantially lower social discount rate than the average return on investments. It also seems likely that taking social preferences into account increases the possibilities of obtaining international agreements, compared to the standard model. However, there are also effects going in the opposite direction, and the importance of sanctions is emphasised.