The Psychology of Fairness

Economists once assumed that people always act to gain as much as possible for themselves. A simple experiment known as the "ultimatum game," however, has cast serious doubt on this idea. In the game, one player is given a sum of money and must offer a share of it to a second player. The two never meet again, and the rules are explained clearly to both. If the second player accepts the offer, each keeps their portion; if the second player refuses, （ 1 ） receives anything at all.

According to the older view, the second player should accept any offer, since even a tiny amount of money is better than none. In practice, this is not what happens. When offers are seen as unfair—say, only ten percent of the total—they are very often rejected, even though refusing means walking away with empty hands. People across many different cultures behave in much the same way, and they appear willing to （ 2 ） a real cost in order to punish behavior they consider greedy or unjust.

Why would humans behave like this? Many researchers believe that a strong sense of fairness evolved because our ancestors depended on cooperation to survive. Individuals who allowed themselves to be exploited again and again would have lost out over time, so a willingness to punish unfairness, even at a price, may well have been advantageous. （ 3 ）, similar reactions have been observed in young children and even in some other animals, which suggests that concern for fairness runs very deep in our nature.