Market Interactions, Trust and Reciprocity
Antonio Cabrales, Irma Clots-Figueras, Roberto Hernán-González, Praveen Kujal
PLOS ONE · 2020
Abstract
Investigates whether exposure to markets and competition erodes or preserves trusting and reciprocal behavior, a long-standing question about the moral consequences of market interaction.
Methodology
Laboratory experiment combining a standard trust game with market-like interactions, varying the competitive environment and the information subjects hold about their counterparts.
Findings
Trust and reciprocity are robust to market exposure rather than being crowded out by it; competitive and market framings shift behavior at the margin but do not eliminate reciprocal responses, complicating the claim that markets corrode pro-social preferences.
Applied nudge
Competitive, transactional framing does not automatically destroy goodwill—preserve reciprocity by keeping counterpart intentions and history visible even inside market-style interfaces.
Citation
Cabrales, A., Clots-Figueras, I., Hernán-González, R., & Kujal, P. (2020). Market interactions, trust and reciprocity. PLOS ONE, 15(5), e0232210.
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