The puzzle of lost wallet game: Challenge of reciprocity theory

Abstract

The theory of reciprocity is one of main topics of behavioral economics and experimental economics in recent several decades. However, lost wallet game proposed by Dufwenberg and Gneezy in 2000 indicated that the reward behavior of wallet owner and the size of the outside option the wallet picker forgone are uncorrelated or weakly correlated. Servátka and Vadovič (2009) and Cox et al (2010) were trying to use the inequality of outside option and the saliency of outside option to the wallet loser to shed some light on the puzzle of lost wallet game, but their experiments hasn't solved the asymmetry between the wallet loser's reward behavior y and the outside option the wallet picker forgone. Therefore, the lost wallet game is still an open puzzle. © 2011 Springer-Verlag Berlin Heidelberg.