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Who Makes a Good Leader? Social Preferences and Leading-by-Example

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Author Info
Simon Gaechter (University of Nottingham)
Daniele Nosenzo (University of Nottingham)
Elke Renner (University of Nottingham)
Martin Sefton (University of Nottingham)

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Abstract

We examine the effects of social preferences and beliefs about the social preferences of others in a simple leader-follower voluntary contributions game. We find that groups perform best when led by those who are reciprocally oriented. Part of the effect can be explained by a false consensus effect: selfish players tend to think it more likely that they are matched with another selfish player and reciprocators tend to think it more likely that they are matched with another reciprocator. Thus, reciprocators contribute more as leaders partly because they are more optimistic than selfish players about the reciprocal responses of followers. However, even after controlling for beliefs we find that reciprocally-oriented leaders contribute more than selfish leaders. Thus, we conclude that differing leader contributions by differing types of leader must in large part reflect social motivations.

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Publisher Info
Paper provided by The Centre for Decision Research and Experimental Economics, School of Economics, University of Nottingham in its series Discussion Papers with number 2008-16.

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Date of creation: Dec 2008
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Handle: RePEc:cdx:dpaper:2008-16

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Related research
Keywords: Reciprocity; Contribution preferences; Leadership; Leading-by-Example; False consensus effect;

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Find related papers by JEL classification:
A13 - General Economics and Teaching - - General Economics - - - Relation of Economics to Social Values
C92 - Mathematical and Quantitative Methods - - Design of Experiments - - - Laboratory, Group Behavior
D03 - Microeconomics - - General - - - Behavioral Economics; Underlying Principles

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  1. Guth, Werner & Levati, M. Vittoria & Sutter, Matthias & van der Heijden, Eline, 2007. "Leading by example with and without exclusion power in voluntary contribution experiments," Journal of Public Economics, Elsevier, vol. 91(5-6), pages 1023-1042, June. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
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  2. Jan Potters & Martin Sefton & Lise Vesterlund, 2007. "Leading-by-example and signaling in voluntary contribution games: an experimental study," Economic Theory, Springer, vol. 33(1), pages 169-182, October. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
  3. Fischbacher, Urs & Gachter, Simon & Fehr, Ernst, 2001. "Are people conditionally cooperative? Evidence from a public goods experiment," Economics Letters, Elsevier, vol. 71(3), pages 397-404, June. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
    Other versions:
  4. Altmann, Steffen & Dohmen, Thomas & Wibral, Matthias, 2008. "Do the reciprocal trust less?," Economics Letters, Elsevier, vol. 99(3), pages 454-457, June. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
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  5. Emrah Arbak & Marie-Claire Villeval, 2007. "Endogenous Leadership Selection and Influence," Working Papers 0707, Groupe d'Analyse et de Théorie Economique (GATE), Centre national de la recherche scientifique (CNRS), Université Lyon 2, Ecole Normale Supérieure. [Downloadable!]
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  6. Meyer, Heinz-Dieter, 1992. "Norms and self-interest in ultimatum bargaining: The prince's prudence," Journal of Economic Psychology, Elsevier, vol. 13(2), pages 215-232, June. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
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  10. Marwell, Gerald & Ames, Ruth E., 1981. "Economists free ride, does anyone else? : Experiments on the provision of public goods, IV," Journal of Public Economics, Elsevier, vol. 15(3), pages 295-310, June. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
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  14. Keser, Claudia & van Winden, Frans, 2000. " Conditional Cooperation and Voluntary Contributions to Public Goods," Scandinavian Journal of Economics, Blackwell Publishing, vol. 102(1), pages 23-39, March. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
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