Social closeness can help, harm and be irrelevant in solving pure coordination problems

Gächter, Simon; Starmer, Chris; Thöni, Christian; Tufano, Fabio; Weber, Till O.

Abstract

Experimental research has shown that ordinary people often perform remarkably well in solving coordination games that involve no conflicts of interest. While most experiments in the past studied such coordination games among socially distant anonymous players, here we study behaviour in a set of two player coordination games and compare the outcomes depending on whether the players are socially close or socially distant. We find that social closeness influences prospects for coordination, but whether it helps, harms, or has no impact on coordination probabilities, depends on the structure of the game.

Citation

Gächter, S., Starmer, C., Thöni, C., Tufano, F., & Weber, T. O. (2022). Social closeness can help, harm and be irrelevant in solving pure coordination problems. Economics Letters, 216, Article 110552. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.econlet.2022.110552

• Journal Article Type: Article
• Acceptance Date: Apr 21, 2022
• Online Publication Date: May 4, 2022
• Publication Date: May 30, 2022
• Deposit Date: May 19, 2022
• Publicly Available Date: May 19, 2022
• Journal: Economics Letters
• Print ISSN: 0165-1765
• Publisher: Elsevier BV
• Peer Reviewed: Peer Reviewed
• Volume: 216
• Article Number: 110552
• DOI: https://doi.org/10.1016/j.econlet.2022.110552
• Keywords: Economics and Econometrics; Finance
• Public URL: https://nottingham-repository.worktribe.com/output/7956885
• Publisher URL: https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0165176522001562?via%3Dihub