American Economic Association What Do Laboratory Experiments Measuring Social Preferences Reveal about the Real World? Author(s): Steven D. Levitt and John A. List Reviewed work(s): Source: The Journal of Economic Perspectives, Vol. 21, No. 2 (Spring, 2007), pp. 153-174 Published by: American Economic Association Stable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/30033722 . Accessed: 03/07/2012 00:24 Your use of the JSTOR archive indicates your acceptance of the Terms & Conditions of Use, available at . http://www.jstor.org/page/info/about/policies/terms.jsp . JSTOR is a not-for-profit service that helps scholars, researchers, and students discover, use, and build upon a wide range of content in a trusted digital archive. We use information technology and tools to increase productivity and facilitate new forms of scholarship. For more information about JSTOR, please contact
[email protected]. American Economic Association is collaborating with JSTOR to digitize, preserve and extend access to The Journal of Economic Perspectives. http://www.jstor.org Journal of EconomicPerspectives-Volume 21, Number2-Spring 2007--Pages 153-174 What Do Laboratory Experiments Measuring Social Preferences Reveal About the Real World? Steven D. Levitt and John A. List Economists have increasingly turned to the experimental model of the physical sciences as a method to understand human behavior. Peer- reviewedreviewed articles using the methodology of experimental economics were almost nonexistent until the mid-1960s and surpassed 50 annually for the first time in 1982; and by 1998, the number of experimental papers published per year exceeded 200 (Holt, 2006). Lab experiments allow the investigator to influence the set of prices, budget sets, information sets, and actions available to actors, and thus measure the impact of these factors on behavior within the context of the labora- tory.