Revisiting Gender Differences in Ultimatum Bargaining: Experimental Evidence from the US and China

Abstract

We report results from a replication of Solnick (2001), which finds using an ultimatum game that, in relation to males, more is demanded from female proposers and less is offered to female responders. We conduct Solnick’s (2001) game using participants from a large US university and a large Chinese university. We find little evidence of gender differences across proposer and responder decisions in both locations. We do however find that, in comparison to Chinese participants, US proposers are more generous, while US responders are more demanding.

Keywords: Gender differences, Cultural differences, Laboratory experiment, Ultimatum game, Bargaining

JEL Classification: C78, C92, J16, Z10