Anticipated Discrimination, Choices, and Performance: Experimental Evidence

Charness, Gary; Cobo-Reyes, Ramón; Meraglia, Simone; Sánchez, Ángela María Muñoz

doi:10.1016/j.euroecorev.2020.103473

Cited by 17 publications

(5 citation statements)

References 49 publications

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“…The screenshots reporting how information was conveyed to the principals are available in the SOM. 9 Previous studies convey gender in different ways, for instance, with the use of avatars (Bohren et al 2019, Charness et al 2020, names (Brock and De Haas 2019), or photographs (Castillo and Petrie 2010) signaling a subject's gender. In the delegation setting of Bottino et al (2016), gender is revealed by showing principals the ID and gender of an agent on the screen.…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

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Choosing Competition on Behalf of Someone Else

2023

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We extend the existing literature on gender differences in competitive behavior by investigating tournament entry choices when a principal decides for an agent. In a laboratory experiment, we randomly assign subjects the role of either principal or agent. The principal decides whether the agent performs a real-effort task under piece-rate or tournament incentives. When deciding, the principal is informed about the agent’s previous performance, age, and residency. Between treatments, we vary whether the principal knows the agent’s gender. In a baseline treatment, we replicate the standard setting in which subjects decide for themselves whether to compete. Our main findings are, first, that there is no gender gap in tournament entry when principals decide for agents as opposed to the baseline treatment. Second, the gender gap closes because more women are made to compete by principals. Third, whereas there is no gender gap in either of the principal treatments, revealing the agent’s gender is associated with higher overall tournament entry rates. Exploratory analyses of principals’ choice determinants reveal a positive effect of preferences to take risks, competitiveness, and confidence in agents’ performances on making agents compete. In addition, we find no difference in how principals evaluate male and female agents’ performances. Finally, we test the efficiency of principals’ competition choices and show that they lead to fewer payoff-maximizing outcomes than when subjects decide for themselves. Additionally, overall tournament performances and winners’ performances are lower when agents are made to compete, but this effect is not robust to controlling for agents’ previous performances. This paper was accepted by Yan Chen, behavioral economics and decision analysis.

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Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…14 Men are sometimes found to perform better than women under both the piece-rate (Charness et al 2020) and competitive payment schemes (Gneezy et al 2003). 15 To ease the interpretation of coefficients, we conduct ordinary least squares regressions throughout the analysis although the dependent variable is binary.…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Choosing Competition on Behalf of Someone Else

2023

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“…As for anticipated discrimination, although it has been widely documented that gender stereotypes harm women's performance in STEM [28], direct evidence of the impact of anticipated discrimination on major choice is limited. For example, Charness et al [29] designed a novel hiring experiment where participants could choose their gender avatar (male, female, or neutral) sent to the firm. When assigned a math-related task, female participants were less likely to show their true gender to the firm because they anticipated potential discrimination.…”

Section: A Brief Review Of Literature On Gender Differences In Major Choicementioning

confidence: 99%

Grey’s Anatomy: Gender Differences in Specialty Choice for Medical Students in China

Shao

Wang

2021

Sustainability

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Gender differences in sub-major choices within the science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM) fields have scarcely been discussed. This study uses administrative records from a top medical school in China to examine gender differences in medical students’ specialty choices. Results showed that, although the gender gap in choosing a clinical track shrinks over time, female students in the clinical track are far less likely to choose highly paid surgical specialties, and this gap persists over time. However, female students outperformed male students in all of the courses. Thus, academic performance cannot explain the underrepresentation of female students in surgery. We further collected questions such as “Why don’t female students choose surgical specialties” and answers to them in “Chinese Quora”, Zhihu.com. A preliminary text analysis showed that ultra-physical load, discrimination in recruitment, women-unfriendly work climates, and difficulties in taking care of family are barriers that prevent women from choosing surgery.

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“…What is your childhood dream? Please name some achievements that you are proud of.4 Subjects do not know how they will be used in order to prevent strategic choices as observed inCharness et al (2020).…”

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confidence: 99%