Nudge strategies
Abstract/Contents
- Abstract
- Whether and how people ("Choice Architects", or CAs) try to exploit the biases of other people ("Choice Makers", or CMs) to influence their choices is critical to understanding strategic interactions in social, political, and economic environments. For instance, CAs must often decide between giving CMs choice sets with positive or certain options (influencing CMs toward safer options) versus negative or risky options (influencing CMs toward riskier options). In Chapter 1, we show that individuals' nudge strategies -- decisions about how to exploit others' biases -- are distorted toward presenting choice sets with positive or certain options, across eleven experiments involving diverse samples (executives, law/business/medical students, adults) and contexts (public policy, business, medicine). These distortions primarily reflect CA decision biases (\textit{loss aversion for choice sets} and a \textit{certainty effect for choice sets}) rather than CA social preferences, and they can cause majorities to use nudge strategies that backfire. Surprisingly, people's predictions about the directional effects of nudges are generally correct. Thus, prompting people to consider their predictions can improve suboptimal nudge strategies. In Chapter 2, we expand the investigation of Chapter 1, focusing on how Choice Architects decide to use a broader set of nudges (e.g. anchors, social norms, and options described using a positive frame) to influence Choice Makers, and how CAs act in more social situations (e.g. negotiations). When people are choosing which influence tactics to use in negotiations and social interactions, how do they choose which anchor to provide, which social norm to present, and whether to use a positive or negative frame to describe an option? We investigate the nudge strategies people use in such situations and document two primary patterns. First, individuals are more likely to use optimal nudge strategies than suboptimal nudge strategies on average, suggesting that they understand the directional effects of influence tactics. Second, individuals' nudge strategies reveal ``pro-social distortions'' towards tactics that can produce positive psychological and/or economic outcomes for their counterparts. We consider and evaluate three theories of CA behavior, based on standard economic theory, pro-social preferences, and the social heuristics hypothesis. In Chapter 3, I report a novel experimental test of the loss aversion theory of Choice Architect behavior introduced in Chapter 1. I construct a measure of loss aversion for choice sets based on people's stated valuations of four influence opportunities. Consistent with loss aversion for choice sets, I find that CAs value loss-framed choice sets less than gain-framed choice sets; moreover, I estimate an average CA loss aversion coefficient of 2.42, very close to CM loss aversion coefficients that have been previously estimated using analogous methods.
Description
| Type of resource | text |
|---|---|
| Form | electronic; electronic resource; remote |
| Extent | 1 online resource. |
| Publication date | 2017 |
| Issuance | monographic |
| Language | English |
Creators/Contributors
| Associated with | Daniels, David P |
|---|---|
| Associated with | Stanford University, Graduate School of Business. |
| Primary advisor | Neale, Margaret Ann |
| Thesis advisor | Neale, Margaret Ann |
| Thesis advisor | Halevy, Nir, 1979- |
| Thesis advisor | Levav, Jonathan, 1975- |
| Advisor | Halevy, Nir, 1979- |
| Advisor | Levav, Jonathan, 1975- |
Subjects
| Genre | Theses |
|---|
Bibliographic information
| Statement of responsibility | David P. Daniels. |
|---|---|
| Note | Submitted to the Graduate School of Business. |
| Thesis | Thesis (Ph.D.)--Stanford University, 2017. |
| Location | electronic resource |
Access conditions
- Copyright
- © 2017 by David Peter Daniels
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