Premium
EMBRACING THE DARK SIDE? TESTING THE SOCIALIZATION OF A MAXIMIZING MINDSET
Author(s) -
Spiegelman Eli
Publication year - 2021
Publication title -
economic inquiry
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 0.823
H-Index - 72
eISSN - 1465-7295
pISSN - 0095-2583
DOI - 10.1111/ecin.12958
Subject(s) - homo economicus , sophistication , economics , mindset , normative , behavioral economics , microeconomics , positive economics , selection (genetic algorithm) , satisficing , experimental economics , great rift , social psychology , psychology , sociology , computer science , physics , astronomy , artificial intelligence , social science , philosophy , epistemology
Previous literature suggests an “economist effect”: business and economics students behave more like Homo economicus than do those from other disciplines. Does this represent selection of selfish maximizers into the disciplines, or a causal effect of study? We argue that common findings that behavior gets no “worse” over time represent overly simplistic tests. Our experiment investigates changes not just in behavior, but also in how participants feel about this behavior. Although we replicate the previous behavioral result, we find evidence that students learn to (1) attach less‐negative normative weight to maximizing behavior, and (2) employ greater sophistication in its implementation. ( JEL A20, D91, C9)