Psychological Pressure in Competitive Environments: New Evidence from Randomized Natural Experiments
Martin G. Kocher, Marc V. Lenz, Matthias Sutter
Management Science · 2012 · Volume 58 · Issue 8
Abstract
Dynamic competitive settings may create psychological pressure when feedback about the performance of competitors is provided before the end of the competition. Such psychological pressure could produce a first-mover advantage, despite a priori equal winning probabilities. Using data from a randomized natural experiment—penalty shootouts in soccer—we reexamine evidence by Apesteguia and Palacios-Huerta [Apesteguia J, Palacios-Huerta I (2010) Psychological pressure in competitive environments: Evidence from a randomized natural experiment. Amer. Econom. Rev . 100(5):2548–2564]. They report a 21-percentage-point advantage for first movers over second movers in terms of winning probabilities. Extending their sample of 129 shootouts to 540, we fail to detect any significant first-mover advantage. Our results are fully consistent with recent evidence from other sports contests. This paper was accepted by Teck Ho, behavioral economics.
Keywords
tournament, first-mover advantage, psychological pressure, field experiment, soccer, penalty shootouts
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