The Discontinuity Effect: The Interaction of Joint Decision-Making with Formal and Informal Sanction Mechanisms

团队是经济决策中一个越来越受欢迎的单位，但在传统经济理论中，团队做出的决策被视为个人决策的同义词。然而，在实验和经验证明个体偏离理论预测的情况下，团队被证明具有更强的认知能力，行为也更理性，这就是所谓的“不连续效应”。本论文项目是第一个探索这种效应在制度选择和自组织中的应用的项目。这将通过三个实验项目来实现，这些实验项目集中在纠正线性公共产品博弈中的非合作行为的正式和非正式机制。在每个设置中，团队作为一个决策单元的行为将与个人的行为进行比较，包括贡献水平和奖励/制裁行为。此外，使用行为模型对每个项目进行理论分析。第一个项目将探索团队通过对制裁和再分配参数进行投票来设计有效的正式机制的能力。第二个项目比较了正式机制和非正式机制的使用情况，包括哪种机制更可取，以及在哪种机制下实现了更高的捐款水平。最后一个项目将检查外部强加的和内部采用的机制的使用，从而确定是否存在“民主溢价”，以及它是否与团队更相关。它假设，群体行为的独特特征将使更强大和可持续的机制得以设计和实施。

Teams are an increasingly popular unit in economic decision making, yetdecisions made by teams are treated as synonymous to those made byindividuals in traditional economic theory. However, where individuals havebeen documented to deviate from theoretical predictions both experimentallyand empirically, teams have been shown to be more cognitively able and tobehave more rationally, referred to as the 'discontinuity effect'. Thisdissertation project is the first to explore this effect in its application toinstitutional choices and self-organisation.This will be achieved using three experimental projects which focus onformal and informal mechanisms to correct non-cooperative behaviour in alinear public goods game. In each setting the behaviour of the team as asingle decision making unit will be compared to that of the individual in theareas including contribution levels and reward/sanction behaviour.Furthermore, complimenting each of these projects will be a theoreticalanalysis using behavioural models.The first project will explore the ability of the team to design an effectiveformal mechanism by voting on sanction and redistribution parameters. Thesecond project compares the use of formal and informal mechanisms,including which is more preferable and under which higher contributionlevels are achieved. The final project will examine the use of exogenouslyimposedand endogenously-adopted mechanisms, thus identifying whethera 'democracy premium' exists, and whether it is more relevant to teams. Itis hypothesised that the unique features of group behaviour will allow formore robust and sustainable mechanisms to be designed and implemented.