Advanced Search
MyIDEAS: Login

Who Makes A Good Leader? Cooperativeness, Optimism And Leading-By-Example

Contents:

Author Info

  • Simon Gaechter

    (Centre for Decision Research and Experimental Economics (CeDEx), University of Nottingham)

  • Daniele Nosenzo

    (Centre for Decision Research and Experimental Economics (CeDEx), University of Nottingham)

  • Elke Renner

    (Centre for Decision Research and Experimental Economics (CeDEx), University of Nottingham)

  • Martin Sefton

    (Centre for Decision Research and Experimental Economics (CeDEx), University of Nottingham)

Abstract

We examine the characteristics of effective leaders in a simple leader-follower voluntary contributions game. We focus on two factors: the individual’s cooperativeness and the individual’s beliefs about the cooperativeness of others. We find that groups perform best when led by those who are cooperatively inclined. Partly this reflects a false consensus effect: cooperative leaders are more optimistic than non-cooperators about the cooperativeness of followers. However, cooperative leaders contribute more than non-cooperative leaders even after controlling for optimism. We conclude that differing leader contributions by differing types of leader in large part reflects social motivations.

Download Info

If you experience problems downloading a file, check if you have the proper application to view it first. In case of further problems read the IDEAS help page. Note that these files are not on the IDEAS site. Please be patient as the files may be large.
File URL: http://www.nottingham.ac.uk/cedex/documents/papers/2009-19.pdf
Download Restriction: no

Bibliographic Info

Paper provided by The Centre for Decision Research and Experimental Economics, School of Economics, University of Nottingham in its series Discussion Papers with number 2009-19.

as in new window
Length:
Date of creation: Oct 2009
Date of revision:
Handle: RePEc:not:notcdx:2009-19

Contact details of provider:
Postal: School of Economics University of Nottingham University Park Nottingham NG7 2RD
Phone: (44) 0115 951 5620
Fax: (0115) 951 4159
Web page: http://www.nottingham.ac.uk/economics/cedex/
More information through EDIRC

Related research

Keywords:

Other versions of this item:

Find related papers by JEL classification:

References

No references listed on IDEAS
You can help add them by filling out this form.

Citations

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

Cited by:
  1. Raphaële Préget & Phu Nguyen-Van & Marc Willinger, 2012. "Who are the Voluntary Leaders? Experimental Evidence from a Sequential Contribution Game," Working Papers 12-34, LAMETA, Universtiy of Montpellier, revised Nov 2012.
  2. Ganna Pogrebna & David Krantz & Christian Schade & Claudia Keser, 2011. "Words versus actions as a means to influence cooperation in social dilemma situations," Theory and Decision, Springer, vol. 71(4), pages 473-502, October.
  3. Johannes Weisser, 2012. "Leading by example in intergroup competition: An experimental approach," Jena Economic Research Papers 2011-067, Friedrich-Schiller-University Jena, Max-Planck-Institute of Economics.
  4. D Nosenzo & Jon Anderson & Stephen V Burks & Jeffrey Carpenter & Lorenz Gotte & Karsten Maurer & Ruth Potter & Kim Rocha & Aldo Rustichini, 2012. "Self-Selection and Variations in the Laboratory Measurment of Other-Regarding Preferences Across Subject Pools: Evidence from One College Student and Two Adult Samples," Discussion Papers 2012-14, The Centre for Decision Research and Experimental Economics, School of Economics, University of Nottingham.
  5. Lisa Bruttel & Urs Fischbacher, 2010. "Taking the initiative. What characterizes leaders?," TWI Research Paper Series 61, Thurgauer Wirtschaftsinstitut, Universität Konstanz.

Lists

This item is not listed on Wikipedia, on a reading list or among the top items on IDEAS.

Statistics

Access and download statistics

Corrections

When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:not:notcdx:2009-19

For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: (Charlene Hill).

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 references are entirely missing, you can add them using this form.

If the full references list an item that is present in RePEc, but the system did not link 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 profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

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