Social and moral distance in risky settings

Abstract While many socially desirable actions are risky and involve non-anonymous others, it remains largely untested whether lower subject-subject anonymity affects behavior under risk. In variations of the dictator game, we vary the party who is exposed to risk and manipulate anonymity by reducing the social and moral distance between parties. We propose a model that allows for ex ante and ex post fairness as well as for context-dependent altruism. Consistent with the model, we find that reducing anonymity increases the frequency of equal splits and hyperfair choices. Allocations nonetheless fall when the dictator’s payoff is risky, regardless of the treatment.