The Impact of Trembling on Behavior in the Trust Game

This paper reports the results of experiments designed to investigate behavior in games when subjects must make an inference about how they arrived at a decision node. Specifically, we investigate a trust game where a random drawing determines if the first mover’s decision is implemented or if instead the first mover trembles and the other action is undertaken. The results indicate that many second movers are willing to give the first mover the benefit of the doubt, but some use the uncertainty to justify more selfish behavior. This pattern is anticipated by first movers who are significantly less likely to trust the other person in this situation than in the typical sequential trust game