We aim to understand whether, in the simplest of possible setting to minimize any likelihood of informational or other mechanisms such as confusion, peer effects and rule compliance still exist and if so why they do. We do this by employing a sequence of online economic experiments with representative samples of the US population and with pre-registered experimental designs. The basic setup of our online experiments involves a one-shot choice between two options implying the same or different (certain or expected) payoffs. Among our other results, we find no evidence for mindless imitation in simple deterministic settings, even when this is costless and when this involves a uniform choice by six peers. In the same settings, we also do not find an explicit request by a peer effective in changing behaviour. Conversely, an explicit request from an authority leads to around 60% of participants to comply, Even with a non-trivial cost and controlling for participants who may have misunderstood the instructions or who were inattentive. This does not appear to be driven by a compliance to social norm, and is a higher compliance rate than can be found using de Quidt et al. (2018) boundary approach for experimenter demand effects. Key other findings will be presented as our research progresses ahead of the conference.