Do Women Shy Away From Competition? Do Men Compete Too Much?

TLDR: Men and women of the same ability differ in their selection into a competitive environment as discussed by the authors, and this gender gap in tournament entry is not explained by performance, and factors such as risk and feedback aversion only play a negligible role.

Abstract: We examine whether men and women of the same ability differ in their selection into a competitive environment. Participants in a laboratory experiment solve a real task, first under a noncompetitive piece rate and then a competitive tournament incentive scheme. Although there are no gender differences in performance, men select the tournament twice as much as women when choosing their compensation scheme for the next performance. While 73 percent of the men select the tournament, only 35 percent of the women make this choice. This gender gap in tournament entry is not explained by performance, and factors such as risk and feedback aversion only playa negligible role. Instead, the tournament-entry gap is driven by men being more overconfident and by gender differences in preferences for performing in a competition. The result is that women shy away from competition and men embrace it.

Figures

Table 6: Distribution of Actual and Optimal Guess of Tournament Rank

Figure 1: CDF of Piece-Rate Performance (Task 1)

Table 10: Probability of Winning Piece-Rate Tournament Conditional on Performance

Table 18: Probit of Tournament-Entry Decision (Task 3)

Figure 4: CDF of Choice Performance (Task 3).

Table 7: Distribution of Guessed Tournament Rank

Frequently asked questions

Q1. What are the contributions in this paper?

The authors examine if absent these factors gender differences in occupations may still occur. Furthermore, while men are more optimistic about their relative performance, differences in beliefs only explain a small share of the gap in tournament entry. 

Q2. What are the future works in this paper?

39 The results of the probit regression in Table 5 confirm that while the participant ’ s gender significantly affects the tournament-entry decision, the future task-3 performance does not. 

Q3. Why do participants have an incentive to guess that they are ranked second or third?

Due to the tie-breaking rule, participants who only know their gender and the performance distributions of men and women have an incentive to guess that they are ranked second or third. 

Q4. What is the effect of beliefs on the participant’s decision to submit to a tournament?

Since the payment from the tournament depends on relative rather than absolute performance, the authors investigate the impact of beliefs on the participant’s decision. 

Q5. What is the reason for the absence of women in more technical fields?

The absence of women in more technical fields extends far beyond academia, e.g., Hewitt and Seymour (1991) find that women only hold 10% of all jobs in physical sciences, engineering and math. 

Q6. How many people are more likely to submit to a tournament when they are the highest performing?

Eliminating participants with a rank of 4 and controlling for the piece-rate performance, women are 33% less likely to submit to the tournament. 

Q7. What is the way to determine whether women and men form different beliefs conditional on performance?

45To determine whether women and men form different beliefs conditional onperformance, the authors use an ordered probit to estimate the guessed rank as a function of tournament performance, the increase in performance and a female dummy. 

Q8. How many percentage points are women more likely to submit to a tournament when they think they are?

Women and men are both about 60 percentage points more likely to submit to a tournament when they think they are the highest performer in their group, rather than the second highest. 

Q9. What are some examples of non-tournament-specific explanations?

Tournament-specific explanations include, for example, that women may have psychic costs of participating in a tournament (or of course, men could receive psychic benefits), or that women and men differ in their preference for or aversion to receiving feedback on performances that occurred in a tournament setting. 

Q10. How much gender effect is female when the authors exclude those with guesses of 4.?

The coefficient on female is -0.379 when the authors exclude those with guesses of 4.including the control for guessed tournament rank the gender effect is 28%. 

Q11. What is the average performance of a man with a guessed rank of 1?

The average performance of a man with a guessed rank of 1 is 12.5, compared to 12 for a guessed rank of 2, 9.5 for a guessed rank of 3.