Does Success Breed Success? a Quasi-Experiment on Strategic Momentum in Dynamic Contests

Gauriot, Romain; Page, Lionel

doi:10.1093/ej/uez040

Cited by 47 publications

(24 citation statements)

References 74 publications

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“…For example, studies have shown the existence of a momentum effect for the winner of a point in dynamic contests (Gauriot et al (2014)). The idea that success breeds success could be captured in our model by an increase of the stock of efforts left during the match depending on success at previous important points.…”

Section: Resultsmentioning

confidence: 99%

Always doing your best? Effort and performance in dynamic settings

2020

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Achieving an ambitious goal frequently requires succeeding in a sequence of intermediate tasks, some being critical for the final outcome, and others not. However, individuals are not always able to provide a level of effort sufficient to guarantee success in all such intermediate tasks. The ability to manage effort throughout the sequence of tasks is therefore critical when resources are limited. In this paper we propose a criterion that defines the importance of a task and identifies how an individual should optimally allocate a limited stock of exhaustible efforts over tasks. We test this importance criterion in a laboratory experiment that reproduces the main features of a tennis match. We show that our importance criterion is able to predict the individuals' performance and it outperforms the Morris importance criterion that defines the importance of a point in terms of its impact on the probability of achieving the final outcome. We also find no evidence of choking under pressure and stress, as proxied by electrophysiological measures. AbstractAchieving an ambitious goal frequently requires succeeding in a sequence of intermediate tasks, some being critical for the final outcome, and others not. However, individuals are not always able to provide a level of effort sufficient to guarantee success in all such intermediate tasks. The ability to manage effort throughout the sequence of tasks is therefore critical when resources are limited. In this paper we propose a criterion that defines the importance of a task and identifies how an individual should optimally allocate a limited stock of exhaustible efforts over tasks. We test this importance criterion in a laboratory experiment that reproduces the main features of a tennis match. We show that our importance criterion is able to predict the individuals' performance and it outperforms the Morris importance criterion that defines the importance of a point in terms of its impact on the probability of achieving the final outcome. We also find no evidence of choking under pressure and stress, as proxied by electrophysiological measures. JEL Classification: C72, C92, D81.

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Section: Resultsmentioning

confidence: 99%

Always doing your best? Effort and performance in dynamic settings

2020

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“…A common prediction is that trailing by a considerable margin leads to further losing, because of the relatively weak incentive to exert effort (Harris and Vickers, 1987). Such a demotivating effect of trailing has been empirically confirmed in, for example, experiments (Dechenaux et al, 2015), tennis (Malueg and Yates, 2010;Page and Coates, 2017;Gauriot and Page, 2019) and political campaigns (Klumpp and Polborn, 2006). For infinitesimal score differences, however, contest theory predicts no material effect on effort and final outcomes.…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 98%

Does Losing Lead to Winning? An Empirical Analysis for Four Different Sports

2020

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Berger and Pope (2011) show that being slightly behind increases the likelihood of winning in professional and collegiate basketball. We extend their analysis to large samples of Australian football, American football and rugby matches, but find little to no evidence of such an effect for these three sports. When we revisit the phenomenon for basketball, we do find supportive evidence for National Basketball Association (NBA) matches from the period analyzed in Berger and Pope. However, we find no significant effect for NBA matches from outside this sample period, for collegiate matches, and for matches from the Women's NBA. High-powered meta-analyses across the different sports and competitions do not reject the null hypothesis of no effect of being slightly behind on winning.

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“…The " winner effect" has been well documented in biology, with the male of a species experiencing an increase in the testosterone level following a win in a (territorial or survival) contest, while the loser has a reduced level of testosterone (Chase et al 1994). Hence, the winner is in better physiological shape to compete in the next contest, as documented in male judo competitions by Cohen-Zada et al (2017) and in male tennis competitions by Page and Coates (2017) and Gauriot and Page (2019). Rather than affecting the physiology of competitors, a successful contestant may gain a psychological boost (Krumer 2013).…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Competitive balance when winning breeds winners

Clark

Nilssen

2020

Soc Choice Welf

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In contest settings, heterogeneity between contestants generally leads to low effort provision, and many instruments have been suggested to restore competitive balance. We suggest that heterogeneity may evolve depending upon the outcome of previous contests. Restoring competitive balance in this setting is challenging, and we consider the choice faced by a principal who can distribute a prize fund over two consecutive all-pay auction contests. Contestants are heterogeneous in the sense that one of them has a head start in the first contest. The winner of contest one gains the stage prize and a net head start in contest two; the size of this net head start also varies between players. The head start of the early leader can be increased, neutralized or overturned. The principal aims to maximize total effort. We show how the potential head start that the initial underdog can gain is critical in determining expected efforts. When this parameter is small, the principal can do no better than running a single contest. When the initial underdog can catch up and surpass the first-contest favourite, there is scope to do better. Indeed, it is possible to completely neutralize the initial heterogeneity and capture all of the surplus from the players, inciting a level of expected effort equal to the prize value. Competitive balance is achieved by a judicious division of the prize budget. Thanks to three referees and an Associate Editor of this journal for very useful comments. We are grateful for the hospitality extended by the Max Planck Institute of Tax Law and Public Finance in Munich, Germany, where much of the research for this paper was done. Comments from Malin Arve, Kai Konrad, Dan Kovenock, and Marco Serena have been invaluable. We would also like to thank participants at seminars at the APET Conference in Hue, Vietnam, the "Contests: Theory and Evidence" conference in Norwich, ASSET in Florence, and Université de Bordeaux for helpful comments. A previous version of this paper was "Beating the Matthew Effect: Head Starts and Catching Up in a Dynamic All-Pay Auction." Errors are our own.

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Does Success Breed Success? a Quasi-Experiment on Strategic Momentum in Dynamic Contests

Cited by 47 publications

References 74 publications

Always doing your best? Effort and performance in dynamic settings

Always doing your best? Effort and performance in dynamic settings

Does Losing Lead to Winning? An Empirical Analysis for Four Different Sports

Competitive balance when winning breeds winners

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