The Mind Game (Jiang, 2013) is a game of chance that allows for undetectable cheating. The essence of the game lies in the choice that has to be made before the random outcome of a die or any other similar device. Thus, it allows for cheating without the risk of being caught and punished as the actual choice is only made in the mind while subjects' payoffs depend on the reported choice. The die-throwing mind game basically consists of the following three steps. Step 1: subjects choose a side (“up” side or “down” side) in their minds. Step 2: subjects throw the online die and the die outcome is observed. Step 3: subjects indicated on the screen the side they have chosen in Step 1. The payoff for each die throw depends on the die-throw outcome corresponding to the reported choice of "up" or "down" (see the payoff table below). For instance, if the outcome is "2" in Step 2 and the subject self reports "down", his/her payoff will be 5. Thus, subjects can cheat by indicating a side in Step 3 that will give them more points: 4, 5, 6 points instead of 1, 2, 3 points, which is cheating if they actually chose a different side in mind in Step 1. (MG Experiments: "Embezzlement", "Favoritism", "Bribery") Feel free to email me for the working papers of these methods. |
My Research >