Extended Asymmetric Dominance: An Experimental Study

Last registered on April 06, 2019

View Trial History

Pre-Trial

Trial Information

General Information

Title

Extended Asymmetric Dominance: An Experimental Study

RCT ID

AEARCTR-0004058

Initial registration date

March 31, 2019

Initial registration date is when the trial was registered.

It corresponds to when the registration was submitted to the Registry to be reviewed for publication.

First published

April 06, 2019, 3:19 PM EDT

First published corresponds to when the trial was first made public on the Registry after being reviewed.

Locations

Country

Israel

Region

Primary Investigator

Name

Amnon Maltz

Affiliation

University of Haifa

Contact Primary Investigator

Other Primary Investigator(s)

Additional Trial Information

Status

In development

Start date

2019-04-03

End date

2019-09-01

Keywords

Other

Additional Keywords

Experiment, Attraction Effect

JEL code(s)

Secondary IDs

Abstract

This study is meant to examine the nature of the asymmetric dominance effect and test a few recent economic models that accommodate this behavioral regularity. To reach this goal we extend the standard experimental framework of asymmetric dominance by introducing subjects with multiple decoy options in different locations.

External Link(s)

Registration Citation

Citation

Maltz, Amnon. 2019. "Extended Asymmetric Dominance: An Experimental Study." AEA RCT Registry. April 06. https://doi.org/10.1257/rct.4058-1.0

Former Citation

Maltz, Amnon. 2019. "Extended Asymmetric Dominance: An Experimental Study." AEA RCT Registry. April 06. https://www.socialscienceregistry.org/trials/4058/history/44749

Sponsors & Partners

Experimental Details

Interventions

Intervention(s)

Intervention Start Date

2019-04-03

Intervention End Date

2019-04-14

Primary Outcomes

Primary Outcomes (end points)

Choice distributions across different choice sets.

Primary Outcomes (explanation)

Secondary Outcomes

Secondary Outcomes (end points)

Secondary Outcomes (explanation)

Experimental Design

Subjects will make choices in 3-different choice contexts. In each context they will face two main options with different decoys.

Experimental Design Details

Overview:

Subjects make choices in 3 different contexts. In each context they encounter 3 or 5 options from which they need to choose. Two of these options, A and B, remain the same across all choice sets within that context. The 3-option sets (two such sets) present the standard asymmetric set-up: Options A and B (that present trade-offs) and another option which is dominated by A (choice set 1) or dominated by B (choice set 2). A between subject comparison of choices across these two sets allows us to examine whether the asymmetric dominance effect is replicated in our 3 contexts. The 5-option sets are similar except for the fact that instead of one decoy for A or B, there are 3: one for A and two for B in choice set 3 (and vice versa in choice set 4). A between subject comparison of choices across these sets allows to examine whether the effect extends to the case of an asymmetric amount of decoys.

Description of the three different contexts:

Two contexts are lotteries and the third consists of bundles comprising high quality pens and a monetary amount. In the first lottery context there is also a 5th choice set which consists of 7 options (3 decoys for option A and 2 for option B). This choice set allows us to test a recent model of reference dependent preferences which accommodates the asymmetric dominance effect.

Control group and Treatment Groups:

The design may be viewed as a randomized controlled trial. For each context, the choice set with 3 alternatives (one decoy) where alternative B is the target (B is the alternative with the higher probability of winning a prize in the lottery contexts or the alternative with more pens in the pen-money context) will be taken as the control-like group. The choice distributions in the other choice sets will be compared to this benchmark group. They will also be compared to each other using Analysis of Variance.

Design:

Between subject design. Each subject is randomly assigned to either one of 5 treatments (with two orders for each). Each subject answers 3 questions (plus one distraction question). The first question (context 1) deals with lotteries, the second (context 2) with bundles (money and pens) and the third with lotteries (context 3).

Planned Analysis:

We will make 3 between-subject comparisons (one for each context). In each context we expect most subjects to choose either one of the two basic options A or B. Comparing the proportions that choose each of the two options (using ANOVA) will allow us to examine whether the basic effect is replicated, understand whether it extends to the multiple-asymmetric-decoy case and test some of the existing models of choice that accommodate it.

Randomization Method

Online questionnaire with randomization done by a computer.

Randomization Unit

Individual.

Was the treatment clustered?

Experiment Characteristics

Sample size: planned number of clusters

Sample size: planned number of observations

About 450

Sample size (or number of clusters) by treatment arms

Roughly 90 subjects in each of the five treatments. This amounts to roughly 90 per choice set in context 1 (where there are 5 different choice sets), and roughly 110 per choice set in contexts 2 and 3 (where there are 4 different choice sets).

Minimum detectable effect size for main outcomes (accounting for sample design and clustering)

Supporting Documents and Materials

IRB