Social and moral distance in risky settings

Anastasios Koukoumelis; M. Vittoria Levati; Chiara Nardi

doi:10.1007/s11238-026-10131-w

Social and moral distance in risky settings

Anastasios Koukoumelis, M. Vittoria Levati, Chiara Nardi

Department of Economics

Research output: Contribution to journal › Article › peer-review

Abstract

While many socially desirable actions are risky and involve non-anonymous others, it remains largely untested whether lower subject-subject anonymity affects behavior under risk. In variations of the dictator game, we vary the party who is exposed to risk and manipulate anonymity by reducing the social and moral distance between parties. We propose a model that allows for ex ante and ex post fairness as well as for context-dependent altruism. Consistent with the model, we find that reducing anonymity increases the frequency of equal splits and hyperfair choices. Allocations nonetheless fall when the dictator’s payoff is risky, regardless of the treatment.

Original language	English
Journal	Theory and Decision
Early online date	9 Apr 2026
DOIs	https://doi.org/10.1007/s11238-026-10131-w
Publication status	E-pub ahead of print - 9 Apr 2026

Data Availability Statement

All experimental data and the code used to generate the results are available upon request.

Funding

Open access funding provided by Università Cattolica del Sacro Cuore within the CRUI-CARE Agreement. This study was funded by the Department of Economics at the University of Verona (Italy).

Keywords

Altruism
Anonymity
Experiment
Fairness
Risk

ASJC Scopus subject areas

General Decision Sciences
Developmental and Educational Psychology
Arts and Humanities (miscellaneous)
Applied Psychology
General Social Sciences
General Economics,Econometrics and Finance
Computer Science Applications

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10.1007/s11238-026-10131-w

Cite this

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AB - While many socially desirable actions are risky and involve non-anonymous others, it remains largely untested whether lower subject-subject anonymity affects behavior under risk. In variations of the dictator game, we vary the party who is exposed to risk and manipulate anonymity by reducing the social and moral distance between parties. We propose a model that allows for ex ante and ex post fairness as well as for context-dependent altruism. Consistent with the model, we find that reducing anonymity increases the frequency of equal splits and hyperfair choices. Allocations nonetheless fall when the dictator’s payoff is risky, regardless of the treatment.

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KW - Anonymity

KW - Experiment

KW - Fairness

KW - Risk

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ER -

Social and moral distance in risky settings

Abstract

Data Availability Statement

Funding

Keywords

ASJC Scopus subject areas

Access to Document

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