Effectiveness of random payment in Experiments: A meta-Analysis of dictator games

Monetary incentives remain an integral component of economics experiments. However, the experimental economics literature is inconclusive when it comes to the effectiveness of random payment mechanisms, specifically in non-strategic individual decision experiments. To contribute to the literature on incentives in experiments, this study performed a meta-analysis of 94 dictator game studies and examined the effect of two frequently used random payment mechanisms on behavior. The mechanisms analyzed were the random problem selection procedure (RPSP) and between-subject random incentivized system (BRIS). The meta-analysis showed that RPSP and BRIS did not significantly alter behavior when compared to a single incentivized decision and incentivizing all subjects, respectively. The results support the effectiveness of RPSP and BRIS in nonstrategic individual decision experiments.