Which behavior-based interventions are more appropriate to induce energy saving: energy saving goals with or without incentive, energy saving products, environmentally related information, social comparison or competition? We try to answer this question in a comprehensive study. First, we...

We conducted an experimental study on social preferences using dictator games similar to Fehr et al. (2008). We show that social preferences differ between participants who receive low-stakes monetary rewards for their decisions and participants who consider hypothetical stakes. The results are...

With the help of a real effort experiment, we analyze if tax evasion depends on the amount of effort invested to generate income. In three treatments, subjects were either endowed with income or had to work moderately or hard to earn it. In line with prospect theory, subjects evaded more taxes...

In order to analyze if heterogeneity in psychological traits affects individual performance in sequential tournaments, we conducted a tennis field experiment. In the experiment, we also varied the payment schemes (individual, team, competition) to control for moderating effects of different...

We analyze the natural experiment of ghost games in the 2019/2020 season of the German football Bundesliga and confirm previous studies showing that the home advantage diminishes if the stadium is empty. However, our paper is the first that distinguishes between effort- and skill-based tasks in...

In alpine skiing competitions, one of the coaches of the participating countries sets the course. This may provide an advantage, but it may also exert higher pressure on the racers. We analyze 40,150 men's and 36,968 women's performances from all competitions in alpine skiing's Slalom, Giant...

Does it matter who pays for ratings? Yes, but not for the rating agencies' behavior. These are the findings of our experiment where we analyze the effect of the remuneration model of rating agencies on their assessments as well as on investors' and issuers' behavior. First, we find that rating...

The main goal of our study is to analyze how success and failure in crucial situations affect subsequent individual performance. Our study is based on evidence from a natural experiment of NBA (National Basketball Association) players: Based on play-by-play statistics of NBA games in 10 seasons...

By extending a typical endowment effect experiment with the possibility to win the endow-ment in a real effort contest, we found two enforcing effects that led to a complete market failure. Subjects who won the item in the competition had an extremely high willingness to accept (trophy effect)....

In a beauty contest experiment with over 6,000 chess players, ranked from amateur to world class, we found that Grandmasters act very similar to other humans. This even holds true when they play exclusively against players of approximately their own strength. In line with psychological research...