Gender Differences in Response to Competitive Organization? Differences Across Fields from a Product Development Platform Field Experiment / Kevin Boudreau, Nilam Kaushik.

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Boudreau, Kevin

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TextSeries: Working Paper Series (National Bureau of Economic Research) ; no. w30062.Publication details: Cambridge, Mass. National Bureau of Economic Research 2022.Description: 1 online resource: illustrations (black and white)Subject(s):

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Abstract: Prior research, primarily based on lab experiments, suggests that females might be more averse to competition than males and could be more inclined towards collaboration, instead. Were these findings to generalize to adults across the workforce, there could be profound implications for organizational design and personnel management. We report on a field experiment in which 97,678 adults from a wide range of fields and ages were invited to join a product development opportunity. Individuals were randomly assigned to treatments framing the opportunity as either involving competitive or collaborative interactions with other participants. Among those outside of science, technology, engineering, and math fields (STEM), we find significant gender differences in willingness to participate under competition. Among those in STEM fields, we detect no statistical gender differences. These results and broader patterns documented in the study are consistent with significant heterogeneity in competitiveness across both men and women, with field and career sorting resulting in differences (in gender differences) across fields.

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Item type	Home library	Collection	Call number	Status	Date due	Barcode	Item holds
Working Paper	Biblioteca Digital	Colección NBER	nber w30062 (Browse shelf(Opens below))	Not for loan

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May 2022.

Prior research, primarily based on lab experiments, suggests that females might be more averse to competition than males and could be more inclined towards collaboration, instead. Were these findings to generalize to adults across the workforce, there could be profound implications for organizational design and personnel management. We report on a field experiment in which 97,678 adults from a wide range of fields and ages were invited to join a product development opportunity. Individuals were randomly assigned to treatments framing the opportunity as either involving competitive or collaborative interactions with other participants. Among those outside of science, technology, engineering, and math fields (STEM), we find significant gender differences in willingness to participate under competition. Among those in STEM fields, we detect no statistical gender differences. These results and broader patterns documented in the study are consistent with significant heterogeneity in competitiveness across both men and women, with field and career sorting resulting in differences (in gender differences) across fields.