Behavioral Law and Economics: Empirical Methods

Engel, Christoph

doi:10.2139/ssrn.2207921

Behavioral Law and Economics: Empirical Methods

MPI Collective Goods Preprint, No. 2013/1

21 Pages Posted: 30 Jan 2013

See all articles by Christoph Engel

Christoph Engel

Max Planck Society for the Advancement of the Sciences - Max Planck Institute for Research on Collective Goods; University of Bonn - Faculty of Law & Economics; Erasmus University Rotterdam (EUR), Erasmus School of Law, Rotterdam Institute of Law and Economics, Students; Universität Osnabrück - Faculty of Law

Date Written: January 2013

Abstract

Originally, behavioral law and economics was an exercise in exploring the implications of key findings from behavioral economics (and psychology) for the analysis and reform of legal institutions. Yet as the new discipline matures, it increasingly replaces foreign evidence by fresh evidence, directly targeted to the legal research question. This chapter surveys the key methods: field evidence, survey data, vignette and lab experiment, discusses their pros and cons, illustrates them with key publications, and concludes with methodological paths for future development. It quantifies statements with descriptive statistics about the 77 behavioral papers that have been published in the Journal of Empirical Legal Studies since its foundation until the end of 2012.

Keywords: behavioral law and economics, law and psychology, criminology, field data, survey data, vignette, lab experiment

JEL Classification: K00, D02, C91, D03, C01, C83

Suggested Citation: Suggested Citation

Engel, Christoph, Behavioral Law and Economics: Empirical Methods (January 2013). MPI Collective Goods Preprint, No. 2013/1. Available at SSRN: https://ssrn.com/abstract=2207921 or http://dx.doi.org/10.2139/ssrn.2207921