Please use this identifier to cite or link to this item: https://hdl.handle.net/10419/323694 
Year of Publication: 
2025
Citation: 
[Journal:] Journal of Business Economics [ISSN:] 1861-8928 [Volume:] 95 [Issue:] 5 [Publisher:] Springer [Place:] Berlin, Heidelberg [Year:] 2025 [Pages:] 725-748
Publisher: 
Springer, Berlin, Heidelberg
Abstract: 
Law makers increasingly try to capitalize on individuals having acquired knowledge of corporate crimes or other misconduct by inducing them to blow the whistle. In a laboratory experiment we measure the effectiveness of incentives on the willingness to report such misconduct to a sanctioning authority. We find that fines for non-reporting insiders, rewards, and even simple commands, increase the probability of whistleblowing. We find the strongest effect for fines. Situational determinants also influence the willingness to blow the whistle: Insiders who are negatively affected by the misconduct are more likely to blow the whistle than non-affected or profiting insiders. Those (negatively affected) victims are also sensitive to the misconduct’s impact on the authority sanctioning the misconduct (public authority or employer): Whistleblowing is more likely if the enforcement authority is negatively affected compared to positively or not affected.
Subjects: 
Whistleblowing
Incentives
Situational determinants
Experiment
JEL: 
C91
D82
K42
M59
Persistent Identifier of the first edition: 
Creative Commons License: 
cc-by Logo
Document Type: 
Article
Document Version: 
Published Version

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