Gender and Economic Norms

I conduct an on-line experiment to test the hypothesis that the divergence in behaver between men and women found in Mayo (2016) was caused by men and women following different economic norms. The definition of norms is based on Bicchieri (2005), and includes three elements: First, that men and women exhibit different behavior. This was shown in Mayo (2016) and is confirmed here. Second, that men and women have different beliefs about what other men and women do and advocate be done when presented with the same options. This was shown in the results of an incentive compatible compensated online survey. Third, that providing messages about the behavior and statements of other men and women would cause a change in behavior. This was tested with an online controlled experiment. The results of this experiment were suggestive of the third element of the hypothesis, but did not prove causation. Further testing with higher statistical power is suggested