Tournament winner proportion and its effect on effort: An investigation of the underlying psychological mechanisms

This study investigates the effects of the psychological mechanisms activated by different proportions of tournament winners on effort. Using a real-effort experiment that allows the evolution of social comparison, which is central to our theory, we show that firms can increase employee effort (and...

Full description

Saved in:
Bibliographic Details
Published in:The European accounting review 2017-10, Vol.26 (4), p.681-702
Main Authors: Knauer, Thorsten, Sommer, Friedrich, Wöhrmann, Arnt
Format: Article
Language:English
Subjects:
Bonuses
Causal models
Führungskraft
Performance management
Personalentwicklung
Psychological mechanisms
Selbstevaluation
Social comparison
Social evolution
Tournaments & championships
USA
Winners
Citations: Items that this one cites
Items that cite this one
Online Access:Get full text
Tags: Add Tag
No Tags, Be the first to tag this record!
Description
Summary:This study investigates the effects of the psychological mechanisms activated by different proportions of tournament winners on effort. Using a real-effort experiment that allows the evolution of social comparison, which is central to our theory, we show that firms can increase employee effort (and performance) by increasing the proportion of winners. Based on a causal model, we generate evidence for our theory that this effect is driven by relative performance concerns and bonus concerns, both of which depend on the proportion of tournament winners. In addition, we find that, over time, the change in effort is more negative the lower the proportion of winners. This effect is driven by the different behaviors of winners and losers in a previous tournament.
ISSN:1468-4497
0963-8180
1468-4497
DOI:10.1080/09638180.2016.1175957