Digital Piracy, Teens, and the Source of Advice: An Experimental Study

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Research Areas: Policy, Law and Management

Principal Investigator: Karthik Kannan

Consumers receive advice from various sources before making consumption decisions. We conduct a laboratory experiment using parents and teenagers as the subject pool, bringing a sample of potential pirates and their parents to the experimental laboratory. Experimental treatments are differentiated by the source of the advice regarding the piracy decision, and subjects make their decisions playing our new experimental game - the piracy game. Advice coming from a source with a greater social tie is more important than advice coming from an unrelated 3rd party. Further, following the advice is most effective when there is a stake for the advisor in influencing the pirate's purchase or pirate decision. Given these results, record producers and industry regulators can develop approaches at disseminating advice about piracy through more effective channels.

Personnel

Other Faculty: Matthew Hashim (The University of Arizona) Sandra Maximiano Jackie Rees