Gender Difference in Volunteer's Dilemma Game

Last registered on November 04, 2019

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Pre-Trial

Trial Information

General Information

Title

Closing the Gender Gap in Volunteering for Low Promotability Tasks: The Role of Nudge and Social Recognition

RCT ID

AEARCTR-0004176

Initial registration date

November 02, 2019

Initial registration date is when the trial was registered.

It corresponds to when the registration was submitted to the Registry to be reviewed for publication.

First published

November 04, 2019, 10:17 AM EST

First published corresponds to when the trial was first made public on the Registry after being reviewed.

Locations

Country

India

Region

Primary Investigator

Name

Priyoma Mustafi

Affiliation

University of Pittsburgh

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Other Primary Investigator(s)

PI Name

Ritwik Banerjee

PI Affiliation

Indian Institute of Management Bangalore

Contact Investigator

Additional Trial Information

Status

In development

Start date

2019-12-01

End date

2020-07-31

Keywords

Gender

Additional Keywords

JEL code(s)

Secondary IDs

Abstract

Volunteering decisions in group settings often involve sacrifice one one's part or some personal disadvantage for the benefit of the group. Babcock et al. (2017) show that compared to males, females volunteer more for low-promotability task. We extend their design to a laboratory based two-stage volunteering game and study gender difference in volunteering. The aim of this paper is to examine a) whether there is a systematic difference in volunteering across gender, and b) whether the gender difference in volunteering is mitigated by i) nudge, ii) positive social recognition and iii) negative social recognition. Our premise rests on the prior that males and females respond differently to positive and negative social recognition for low stake volunteering tasks.

External Link(s)

Registration Citation

Citation

Banerjee, Ritwik and Priyoma Mustafi. 2019. "Closing the Gender Gap in Volunteering for Low Promotability Tasks: The Role of Nudge and Social Recognition." AEA RCT Registry. November 04. https://doi.org/10.1257/rct.4176-1.0

Sponsors & Partners

Experimental Details

Interventions

Intervention(s)

Intervention Start Date

2019-12-01

Intervention End Date

2020-02-29

Primary Outcomes

Primary Outcomes (end points)

Probability of investing

Primary Outcomes (explanation)

Secondary Outcomes

Secondary Outcomes (end points)

Time taken to volunteer

Secondary Outcomes (explanation)

Experimental Design

The game is played for ten rounds each, in which the participants are randomly and anonymously assigned to groups of three. Each round consists of two stages. In Stage 1, the participants are given anywhere between 45 to 90 seconds to decide whether they individually wish to volunteer or invest in a group account, on behalf of the group. They do not exactly know how much time has been allotted to their group. Incentive structure of the game is such that a group member is better off waiting for someone in his/her group to invest. At the end of Stage 1, the participants receive information about which group member was the 'investor', if any. In Stage 2, with the group composition remaining the same, the participants again have to individually take this investment decision within the unknown stipulated time.
Our treatments differ in terms of the information given at the end of Stage 1. In our baseline treatment, we give the participants no information about the investor. In the nudge treatment, we just display the player's neutral identity in the group to investigate the effect of a 'nudge'. In the next treatment, fictitious names of the investors are displayed on the participants screens.
Three additional treatments are designed to investigate how social recognition induce investing. Subjects are told that each group will be displayed the names of the investor and publicly congratulated in the positive social recognition treatment. In the negative social recognition treatment, they are told that the names of the two non-investors will be displayed. Finally, in the positive and negative social recognition treatment, both the names of the investor and non-investors are displayed. Likelihood of investing is compared across treatments.

Experimental Design Details

Randomization Method

Randomization done by software ztree (used for laboratory experiments)

Randomization Unit

Individual

Was the treatment clustered?

Experiment Characteristics

Sample size: planned number of clusters

Sample size: planned number of observations

500

Sample size (or number of clusters) by treatment arms

80 by each treatment arms

Minimum detectable effect size for main outcomes (accounting for sample design and clustering)

Supporting Documents and Materials

IRB

Institutional Review Boards (IRBs)

IRB Name

IRB Approval Date

IRB Approval Number

Analysis Plan

Post-Trial

Post Trial Information

Study Withdrawal

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Intervention

Is the intervention completed?

Data Collection Complete

Data Publication

Is public data available?

Program Files

Reports, Papers & Other Materials