Epic fail

"A growing body of evidence suggests that self-interested behavior is learned behavior, and people learn it by studying economics and business. Marwell and Ames, in a series of twelve experiments, found that “people voluntarily contribute substantial portions of their resources...to the provision of a public good” (1981: 307). These experiments consistently contradicted the economic assumption of free riding, with one exception. Economics graduate students were far more likely to free ride than any other group of subjects, contributing only about 20 percent of their resources to the group, compared to the 42 percent contributed by non-economists (Marwell & Ames, 1981: 6–307)."

A couple of articles (the quote comes from the latter):

Amartya K. Sen's “Rational Fools: A Critique of Behaviour Foundations of Economic Theory” (Philosophy & Public Affairs, 1977)

Ferraro, Pfeffer, and Sutton's “Economics Language and Assumptions: How Theories can Become Self-Fulfilling” (Academy of Management Review, 2005)