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Coordination with communication under oath

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  14 March 2025

Nicolas Jacquemet ,
Stéphane Luchini ,
Jason F. Shogren  and
Adam Zylbersztejn
Nicolas Jacquemet*
Affiliation:
Paris School of Economics, University Paris 1 Panthéon-Sorbonne, MSE, 106 Bd de l’hopital, 75013 Paris, France
Stéphane Luchini*
Affiliation:
Centre de la Vieille Charité, GREQAM-CNRS, 13236 Marseille Cedex 02, France
Jason F. Shogren*
Affiliation:
Department of Economics and Finance, University of Wyoming, Laramie, WY 82071-3985, USA
Adam Zylbersztejn*
Affiliation:
GATE L-SE UMR 5824, Univ Lyon, Université Lumière Lyon 2, 69131 Ecully, France
*
nicolas.jacquemet@univ-paris1.fr
stephane.luchini@univmed.fr
JRamses@uwyo.edu
zylbersztejn@gate.cnrs.fr
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Abstract

We focus on the design of an institutional device aimed to foster coordination through communication. We explore whether the social psychology theory of commitment, implemented via a truth-telling oath, can reduce coordination failure. Using a classic coordination game, we ask all players to sign voluntarily a truth-telling oath before playing the game with cheap talk communication. Three results emerge with commitment under oath: (1) coordination increased by nearly 50%; (2) senders’ messages were significantly more truthful and actions more efficient, and (3) receivers’ trust of messages increased.

Keywords

Coordination gameCheap talk communicationOath

JEL classification

D83: Search • Learning • Information and Knowledge • Communication • Belief • Unawareness C72: Noncooperative Games
Type
Original Paper
Information
Experimental Economics , Volume 21 , Issue 3: Special Issue in Honor of John Van Huyck , September 2018 , pp. 627 - 649
Copyright
Copyright © 2017 Economic Science Association

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Footnotes

Electronic supplementary material The online version of this article (doi:https://doi.org/10.1007/s10683-016-9508-x) contains supplementary material, which is available to authorized users.

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