This paper studies an economic contest with two participants, who are overconfident in their own relative abilities. We examine two different sources of overconfidence, overestimation of one's own ability and underestimation of the rival's ability, and compare the behavioral consequences of each...

Are overconfident beliefs driven by the motivation to view oneself positively? We test the relationship between motivation and overconfidence using two distinct, but often conflated measures: better-than-average (BTA) beliefs and overplacement. Our results suggest that motivation can indeed...