Risk-Taking in High-Stakes Competition: Evidence from Olympic Indoor Volleyball

How do elite athletes adjust risk-taking across score contexts and tournament stages, and how do these patterns differ between men’s and women’s tournaments? We address these questions using a novel, manually coded rally-level dataset from the 2024 Olympic volleyball tournaments, covering 8,670 rallies from 52 men’s and women’s matches. We operationalize risk through observable tactical choices — serve type and attack placement — and estimate how these choices respond to score context, set progression, and playoff stakes. We find that risk-taking is systematically gendered and context-dependent: men attempt riskier serves as sets near their end, while women grow more conservative when protecting a set lead. In attacking, both genders turn more cautious late in sets. This asymmetry aligns with prospect theory since serving is a loss-domain decision that invites risk-seeking, while attacking is a gain-domain decision that invites risk aversion. Contrary to expectations of caution under elimination pressure, both genders take more risks in the knockout stage. These findings extend behavioral models of risk to a high-stakes team sport setting, with implications for coaching and performance analysis.