【主讲】梁平汉 (中山大学)
【主题】The Prisoners' Redemption: A Field Experiment on Charitable Contribution by Chinese Prison Inmates
【时间】2016年10月31日 (周一) 10：00-11：30
【地点】上海财经大学经济学院楼701室
【语言】英文
【摘要】This paper addresses how the social identity affects the pro-social behavior and in-group favoritism among inmates. We conduct a field experiment in a typical Chinese jail and introduce a real-effort charitable contribution scheme into the inmates’ ordinary workplace. The amount of charity is tied to the inmates’ output. The main treatment variable is the social identity of the beneficiary. During the five-day experiment, inmates exhibit substantial pro-social behavior: the average output raises 3.4--11%. There is also evidence of in-group favoritism in that the output increases more when the beneficiary is tied to the prisoner identity. However, when the beneficiary is tied to the prisoner identity, the inmates with long incarceration spells have significantly lower output than those with short incarceration spell, indicating that the stronger prisoner identity weaken the inmates’ in-group favoritism. We suggest that the competitive culture among inmates might explain the negative effects of group identity associated with the prison inmates.
