IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/eee/joepsy/v75y2019ipbs0167487017307511.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

The lions–foxes dilemma: The case of chess tournaments

Author

Listed:
  • Zak, Uri
  • Avrahami, Judith
  • Kareev, Yaakov

Abstract

In various contexts, people can choose between joining a prestigious competition or a less prestigious one. Their relative position is likely to be lower in the former than in the latter, presenting them with a dilemma. This study is one of the first to empirically examine such choices and their implications in the context of sporting competitions, specifically chess tournaments in Israel. In chess tournaments, players of medium ranking are often given a choice: to compete against stronger opponents in the main tournament (and likely be at “the back of a pride of lions”) or to compete against weaker opponents in the secondary tournament (and likely be at “the head of a pack of foxes”). Using official chess results provided by the Israeli Chess Federation, we identified the players who were in a position to choose between participating in a main and a secondary tournament from 2010 through 2017. We found that even after controlling for chess ratings and opponents’ levels (as well as age, gender, experience, momentum, and the effect of the time-control factor), players who chose to participate in the secondary tournament performed 11.8% better than those who chose to participate in the main tournament. Apparently, in the context we studied, one is better off at the head of a pack of foxes than at the back of a pride of lions.

Suggested Citation

  • Zak, Uri & Avrahami, Judith & Kareev, Yaakov, 2019. "The lions–foxes dilemma: The case of chess tournaments," Journal of Economic Psychology, Elsevier, vol. 75(PB).
    • Handle: RePEc:eee:joepsy:v:75:y:2019:i:pb:s0167487017307511
    DOI: 10.1016/j.joep.2018.08.008
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0167487017307511
    Download Restriction: Full text for ScienceDirect subscribers only
    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.1016/j.joep.2018.08.008?utm_source=ideas
    LibKey link: if access is restricted and if your library uses this service, LibKey will redirect you to where you can use your library subscription to access this item
    ---><---

    As the access to this document is restricted, you may want to search for a different version of it.

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Edwin Leuven & Hessel Oosterbeek & Joep Sonnemans & Bas van der Klaauw, 2011. "Incentives versus Sorting in Tournaments: Evidence from a Field Experiment," Journal of Labor Economics, University of Chicago Press, vol. 29(3), pages 637-658.
    2. Gali, Jordi, 1994. "Keeping Up with the Joneses: Consumption Externalities, Portfolio Choice, and Asset Prices," Journal of Money, Credit and Banking, Blackwell Publishing, vol. 26(1), pages 1-8, February.
    3. Tor Eriksson & Sabrina Teyssier & Marie‐Claire Villeval, 2009. "Self‐Selection And The Efficiency Of Tournaments," Economic Inquiry, Western Economic Association International, vol. 47(3), pages 530-548, July.
    4. John P. Conley & Ali Sina Onder, 2014. "The Research Productivity of New PhDs in Economics: The Surprisingly High Non-success of the Successful," Journal of Economic Perspectives, American Economic Association, vol. 28(3), pages 205-216, Summer.
    5. Ghazala Azmat & Marc Möller, 2009. "Competition among contests," RAND Journal of Economics, RAND Corporation, vol. 40(4), pages 743-768, December.
    6. John Morgan & Dana Sisak & Felix Várdy, 2018. "The Ponds Dilemma," Economic Journal, Royal Economic Society, vol. 128(611), pages 1634-1682, June.
    7. Andrew E. Clark & Paul Frijters & Michael A. Shields, 2008. "Relative Income, Happiness, and Utility: An Explanation for the Easterlin Paradox and Other Puzzles," Journal of Economic Literature, American Economic Association, vol. 46(1), pages 95-144, March.
    8. Stacy Berg Dale & Alan B. Krueger, 2002. "Estimating the Payoff to Attending a More Selective College: An Application of Selection on Observables and Unobservables," The Quarterly Journal of Economics, President and Fellows of Harvard College, vol. 117(4), pages 1491-1527.
    9. Soiliou Namoro & Timothy Mathews, 2006. "Participation Incentives in Rank Order Tournaments with Endogenous Entry," Working Paper 250, Department of Economics, University of Pittsburgh, revised Feb 2008.
    10. Konrad, Kai A., 2009. "Strategy and Dynamics in Contests," OUP Catalogue, Oxford University Press, number 9780199549603, Decembrie.
    11. Julie Berry Cullen & Brian A Jacob & Steven Levitt, 2006. "The Effect of School Choice on Participants: Evidence from Randomized Lotteries," Econometrica, Econometric Society, vol. 74(5), pages 1191-1230, September.
    12. Linnemer, Laurent & Visser, Michael, 2016. "Self-selection in tournaments: The case of chess players," Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, Elsevier, vol. 126(PA), pages 213-234.
    13. Ehrenberg, Ronald G & Bognanno, Michael L, 1990. "Do Tournaments Have Incentive Effects?," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 98(6), pages 1307-1324, December.
    14. Frank, Robert H, 1984. "Are Workers Paid Their Marginal Products?," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 74(4), pages 549-571, September.
    15. Papke, Leslie E & Wooldridge, Jeffrey M, 1996. "Econometric Methods for Fractional Response Variables with an Application to 401(K) Plan Participation Rates," Journal of Applied Econometrics, John Wiley & Sons, Ltd., vol. 11(6), pages 619-632, Nov.-Dec..
    16. Timothy Mathews & Soiliou Namoro, 2008. "Participation incentives in rank order tournaments with endogenous entry," Journal of Economics, Springer, vol. 95(1), pages 1-23, October.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Citations

    Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
    as


    Cited by:

    1. Dilmaghani, Maryam, 2022. "Chess girls don’t cry: Gender composition of games and effort in competitions among the super-elite," Journal of Economic Psychology, Elsevier, vol. 89(C).
    2. Pastoriza, David & Alegre, Inés & Canela, Miguel A., 2021. "Conditioning the effect of prize on tournament self-selection," Journal of Economic Psychology, Elsevier, vol. 86(C).

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Ghazala Azmat & Marc Möller, 2018. "The Distribution of Talent Across Contests," Economic Journal, Royal Economic Society, vol. 128(609), pages 471-509, March.
    2. Pastoriza, David & Alegre, Inés & Canela, Miguel A., 2021. "Conditioning the effect of prize on tournament self-selection," Journal of Economic Psychology, Elsevier, vol. 86(C).
    3. Amegashie, J. Atsu, 2019. "Quantity-cum-quality contests," European Journal of Political Economy, Elsevier, vol. 58(C), pages 289-297.
    4. Linnemer, Laurent & Visser, Michael, 2016. "Self-selection in tournaments: The case of chess players," Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, Elsevier, vol. 126(PA), pages 213-234.
    5. Martin Grossmann, 2021. "Entry regulations and optimal prize allocation in parallel contests," Review of Economic Design, Springer;Society for Economic Design, vol. 25(4), pages 289-316, December.
    6. repec:hal:spmain:info:hdl:2441/2ldopuhqfp8e7oriqpulud8k5o is not listed on IDEAS
    7. Ghazala Azmat & Marc Möller, 2018. "The Distribution of Talent Across Contests," Economic Journal, Royal Economic Society, vol. 128(609), pages 471-509, March.
    8. Loukas Balafoutas & E. Glenn Dutcher & Florian Lindner & Dmitry Ryvkin, 2017. "The Optimal Allocation Of Prizes In Tournaments Of Heterogeneous Agents," Economic Inquiry, Western Economic Association International, vol. 55(1), pages 461-478, January.
    9. Deutscher, Christian & Gürtler, Marc & Gürtler, Oliver & DeVaro, Jed, 2020. "Firm choice and career success - theory and evidence," European Economic Review, Elsevier, vol. 127(C).
    10. De Paola, Maria & Gioia, Francesca & Scoppa, Vincenzo, 2018. "The adverse consequences of tournaments: Evidence from a field experiment," Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, Elsevier, vol. 151(C), pages 1-18.
    11. Dohmen, Thomas, 2014. "Behavioral labor economics: Advances and future directions," Labour Economics, Elsevier, vol. 30(C), pages 71-85.
    12. Leuven, Edwin & Oosterbeek, Hessel & van der Klaauw, Bas, 2010. "Splitting Tournaments," IZA Discussion Papers 5186, Institute of Labor Economics (IZA).
    13. Emmanuel Dechenaux & Dan Kovenock & Roman Sheremeta, 2015. "A survey of experimental research on contests, all-pay auctions and tournaments," Experimental Economics, Springer;Economic Science Association, vol. 18(4), pages 609-669, December.
    14. Sheremeta, Roman, 2009. "Essays on Experimental Investigation of Lottery Contests," MPRA Paper 49888, University Library of Munich, Germany.
    15. Cason, Timothy N. & Masters, William A. & Sheremeta, Roman M., 2010. "Entry into winner-take-all and proportional-prize contests: An experimental study," Journal of Public Economics, Elsevier, vol. 94(9-10), pages 604-611, October.
    16. Frick, Bernd, 2011. "Gender differences in competitiveness: Empirical evidence from professional distance running," Labour Economics, Elsevier, vol. 18(3), pages 389-398, June.
    17. Wang, Zhen & Vukina, Tomislav, 2017. "Sorting into Contests: Evidence from Production Contracts," ARE Working Papers 262930, North Carolina State University, Department of Agricultural and Resource Economics.
    18. Tracy Xiao Liu & Jiang Yang & Lada A. Adamic & Yan Chen, 2014. "Crowdsourcing with All-Pay Auctions: A Field Experiment on Taskcn," Management Science, INFORMS, vol. 60(8), pages 2020-2037, August.
    19. Luke Boosey & Philip Brookins & Dmitry Ryvkin, 2020. "Information Disclosure in Contests with Endogenous Entry: An Experiment," Management Science, INFORMS, vol. 66(11), pages 5128-5150, November.
    20. Noemí Herranz-Zarzoso & Gerardo Sabater-Grande, 2020. "Self-selection bias in a field experiment: Recruiting subjects under different payment schemes," Working Papers 2020/13, Economics Department, Universitat Jaume I, Castellón (Spain).
    21. Ghazala Azmat & Marc Möller, 2016. "The Distribution of Talent across Contests Feedback in Higher Education," Working Papers 789, Queen Mary University of London, School of Economics and Finance.

    More about this item

    Keywords

    Choice behavior; Chess; Tournament choice; Big-fish-little-pond effect;
    All these keywords.

    JEL classification:

    • D71 - Microeconomics - - Analysis of Collective Decision-Making - - - Social Choice; Clubs; Committees; Associations
    • Z20 - Other Special Topics - - Sports Economics - - - General

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:eee:joepsy:v:75:y:2019:i:pb:s0167487017307511. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Catherine Liu (email available below). General contact details of provider: http://www.elsevier.com/locate/joep .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.