The Role of Visibility on Third Party Punishment Actions for the Enforcement of Social Norms

What is it about?

A prisoner’s dilemma game experiment with a third party punisher was conducted. Third parties do not punish cooperators when their punitive actions are visible in a dilemma. Third parties impose strong punishment on a norm violator with high visibility. With high visibility, a player receives a higher expected payoff by cooperating than by defecting.

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Why is it important?

My research result is consistent with theoretical work that proposes that the visibility of actions enhances people’s pro-social behavior through image motivation. The experimental result suggests that raising the visibility of third parties’ punitive actions can be a powerful device for disciplining their sanctioning activities.