doi: 10.53962/hyf6-hfz7
Originally published on 2022-12-12 under a CC0 Public Domain Dedication
Corruption – commonly defined as the abuse of entrusted power for private gains – has immense societal costs. In recent decades empirical work on the behavioral elements of corruption has grown. An increasing number of corruption games has been developed in behavioral economics, political science and psychology, aiming to translate real-world corrupt practices into standardized games. The most important form of such corruption games are bribery games, which share the following structural features: (i) at least two agents – briber and bribe – engage in a transaction,(ii) this transaction causes negative externalities for a third party, and (iii), power asymmetry exists between briber and bribee. So far, no meta-analytical evidence on bribery games exists. To provide first aggregate insights into situational and individual factors of bribery, we (a) searched for bribery games by following a pre-registered online search as well as issuing various calls for unpublished data (see Figure 1). This search identified 1620 papers. In a second step, we (b) screened titles, abstracts and full-texts according to pre-specified inclusion criteria, yielding a total of 120 unique papers, encompassing 526 different experimental treatments, and a total of 35,287 participants. We are currently analyzing the data and by January will be able to present the first aggregate insights into the situational and individual factors of bribery. The results provide an overview of some of the most important predictors and consequences of corruption as well as sketching practical decision guidelines to facilitate the choice and use of corruption games for academics and practitioners alike.