Law and Norms: Empirical Evidence

Tom Lane; Daniele Nosenzo; Silvia Sonderegger

doi:10.1257/aer.20210970

Law and Norms: Empirical Evidence

Tom Lane, Daniele Nosenzo, Silvia Sonderegger^*

^*Corresponding author for this work

Department of Economics and Business Economics

Research output: Contribution to journal/Conference contribution in journal/Contribution to newspaper › Journal article › Research › peer-review

20 Citations (Scopus)

Abstract

A large theoretical literature argues laws exert a causal effect on norms, but empirical evidence remains scant. Using a novel identification strategy, we provide a compelling empirical test of this proposition. We use incentivized vignette experiments to directly measure social norms relating to actions subject to legal thresholds. Our large-scale experiments (n = 7,000) run in the United Kingdom, United States, and China show that laws can causally influence social norms. Results are robust across different samples and methods of measuring norms, and are consistent with a model of social image concerns where individuals care about the inferences others make about their underlying prosociality.

Original language	English
Journal	American Economic Review
Volume	113
Issue	5
Pages (from-to)	1255-1293
Number of pages	39
ISSN	0002-8282
DOIs	https://doi.org/10.1257/aer.20210970
Publication status	Published - May 2023

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Law and Norms: Empirical Evidence

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