Is Sin Always a Sin? The Interaction Effect of Social Norms and Financial Incentives on Market Participants’ Behavior
Accounting, Organizations and Society, Forthcoming
Rotman School of Management Working Paper No. 2419667
Singapore Management University School of Accountancy Research Paper No. 2015-21
53 Pages Posted: 4 Apr 2014
Date Written: March 31, 2014
Abstract
Using alcohol, tobacco, and gaming consumption data and people’s attitudes toward these sin products to proxy for social norm acceptance levels, we show a strong interaction effect between social norms and financial incentives, which significantly influence the behavior of market participants. Specifically, institutional investors’ shareholdings and analyst coverage of sin companies increase with the degree of social norm acceptance. The association between shareholdings/coverage and social norm acceptance is less pronounced for firms with higher future expected performance. Our results show that social norms and financial incentives have a powerful interaction effect in determining the behavior of market participants, suggesting that social norms can be crossed when motive and opportunity exist.
Keywords: Social norms, financial incentives, sin stocks
JEL Classification: G11, D71, M40
Suggested Citation: Suggested Citation