Media release

From: The Royal Society

Can monetary incentives overturn fairness-based decisions?

Fairness is a strong social norm and forms the basis for cooperation. Here, we investigated whether participants still enforce the fairness norm if they are paid to behave unfairly. We found that financial incentives for unfair behavior decreased the propensity to punish observed unfair behavior and to compensate others that have experienced unfairness. Specifying these findings, mathematical modelling revealed that incentives for unfair behavior decrease the efficiency of making a fair decision. These findings show that financial incentives can overrule fairness considerations, and thus should be used with caution in institutions and society.