IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/eee/joepsy/v57y2016icp136-152.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Revealing side effects of quota rules on group cooperation

Author

Listed:
  • Dorrough, Angela R.
  • Leszczyńska, Monika
  • Barreto, Manuela
  • Glöckner, Andreas

Abstract

The quota rule in employment is a legal tool to promote gender equality in professions and positions where women are underrepresented. An accompanying assumption is that gender diversity positively affects one of the aspects of team performance in form of group cooperation. However, it is unclear whether this positive effect can be achieved if diversity increases due to a quota rule. In two fully incentivized experiments involving a real-effort task (N1=188 and N2=268), we examined the impact of quotas as compared to performance-based promotion on group cooperation. We thereby categorized participants either with regard to gender or to an artificial category that was randomly assigned. Cooperation within groups declined when promotion was based on quota compared to performance-based promotion, irrespective of the categorization criterion. Further analyses revealed that this negative effect of quota rules on cooperation is not driven by procedural fairness perceptions or expectations about performance of the promoted group member. Implications of the results for the implementation of equality and diversity initiatives are discussed.

Suggested Citation

  • Dorrough, Angela R. & Leszczyńska, Monika & Barreto, Manuela & Glöckner, Andreas, 2016. "Revealing side effects of quota rules on group cooperation," Journal of Economic Psychology, Elsevier, vol. 57(C), pages 136-152.
    • Handle: RePEc:eee:joepsy:v:57:y:2016:i:c:p:136-152
    DOI: 10.1016/j.joep.2016.09.007
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0167487016306183
    Download Restriction: Full text for ScienceDirect subscribers only
    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.1016/j.joep.2016.09.007?utm_source=ideas
    LibKey link: if access is restricted and if your library uses this service, LibKey will redirect you to where you can use your library subscription to access this item
    ---><---

    As the access to this document is restricted, you may want to search for a different version of it.

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. De Cremer, David & Tyler, Tom R. & Ouden, Nathalie den, 2005. "Managing cooperation via procedural fairness: The mediating influence of self-other merging," Journal of Economic Psychology, Elsevier, vol. 26(3), pages 393-406, June.
    2. Kenneth R. Ahern & Amy K. Dittmar, 2012. "The Changing of the Boards: The Impact on Firm Valuation of Mandated Female Board Representation," The Quarterly Journal of Economics, President and Fellows of Harvard College, vol. 127(1), pages 137-197.
    3. Dufwenberg, Martin & Muren, Astri, 2006. "Gender composition in teams," Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, Elsevier, vol. 61(1), pages 50-54, September.
    4. Crusius, Jan & van Horen, Femke & Mussweiler, Thomas, 2012. "Why process matters: A social cognition perspective on economic behavior," Journal of Economic Psychology, Elsevier, vol. 33(3), pages 677-685.
    5. Heilman, Madeline E. & Lucas, Jonathan A. & Kaplow, Stella R., 1990. "Self-derogating consequences of sex-based preferential selection: The moderating role of initial self-confidence," Organizational Behavior and Human Decision Processes, Elsevier, vol. 46(2), pages 202-216, August.
    6. Vlaev, Ivo, 2012. "How different are real and hypothetical decisions? Overestimation, contrast and assimilation in social interaction," Journal of Economic Psychology, Elsevier, vol. 33(5), pages 963-972.
    7. Ben Greiner, 2015. "Subject pool recruitment procedures: organizing experiments with ORSEE," Journal of the Economic Science Association, Springer;Economic Science Association, vol. 1(1), pages 114-125, July.
    8. Ben Greiner, 2004. "The Online Recruitment System ORSEE 2.0 - A Guide for the Organization of Experiments in Economics," Working Paper Series in Economics 10, University of Cologne, Department of Economics.
    9. Ben Greiner, 2004. "The Online Recruitment System ORSEE - A Guide for the Organization of Experiments in Economics," Papers on Strategic Interaction 2003-10, Max Planck Institute of Economics, Strategic Interaction Group.
    10. Balafoutas, Loukas & Sutter, Matthias, 2010. "Gender, Competition and the Efficiency of Policy Intervention," Working Papers in Economics 450, University of Gothenburg, Department of Economics.
    11. Victoria Prowse & David Gill, 2009. "A Novel Computerized Real Effort Task Based on Sliders," Economics Series Working Papers 435, University of Oxford, Department of Economics.
    12. Lindner, Florian, 2014. "Decision time and steps of reasoning in a competitive market entry game," Economics Letters, Elsevier, vol. 122(1), pages 7-11.
    13. Sander Hoogendoorn & Hessel Oosterbeek & Mirjam van Praag, 2013. "The Impact of Gender Diversity on the Performance of Business Teams: Evidence from a Field Experiment," Management Science, INFORMS, vol. 59(7), pages 1514-1528, July.
    14. Cohen-Charash, Yochi & Spector, Paul E., 2001. "The Role of Justice in Organizations: A Meta-Analysis," Organizational Behavior and Human Decision Processes, Elsevier, vol. 86(2), pages 278-321, November.
    15. David Gill & Victoria Prowse, 2012. "A Structural Analysis of Disappointment Aversion in a Real Effort Competition," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 102(1), pages 469-503, February.
    16. Leonie Gerhards & Neele Siemer, 2014. "Private versus Public Feedback - The Incentive Effects of Symbolic Awards," Economics Working Papers 2014-01, Department of Economics and Business Economics, Aarhus University.
    17. Ivanova-Stenzel, Radosveta & Kübler, Dorothea, 2011. "Gender differences in team work and team competition," Journal of Economic Psychology, Elsevier, vol. 32(5), pages 797-808.
    18. Oberholzer-Gee, Felix & Bohnet, Iris & Frey, Bruno S, 1997. "Fairness and Competence in Democratic Decisions," Public Choice, Springer, vol. 91(1), pages 89-105, April.
    19. Ortmann, Andreas & Tichy, Lisa K., 1999. "Gender differences in the laboratory: evidence from prisoner's dilemma games," Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, Elsevier, vol. 39(3), pages 327-339, July.
    20. Urs Fischbacher, 2007. "z-Tree: Zurich toolbox for ready-made economic experiments," Experimental Economics, Springer;Economic Science Association, vol. 10(2), pages 171-178, June.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Citations

    Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
    as


    Cited by:

    1. Gill, David & Prowse, Victoria, 2019. "Measuring costly effort using the slider task," Journal of Behavioral and Experimental Finance, Elsevier, vol. 21(C), pages 1-9.

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Martin Kesternich & Andreas Lange & Bodo Sturm, 2018. "On the performance of rule-based contribution schemes under endowment heterogeneity," Experimental Economics, Springer;Economic Science Association, vol. 21(1), pages 180-204, March.
    2. Cason, Timothy N. & Gangadharan, Lata & Grossman, Philip J., 2022. "Gender, beliefs, and coordination with externalities," Journal of Public Economics, Elsevier, vol. 214(C).
    3. Timothy N. Cason & Lata Gangadharan, 2022. "Gender, Beliefs, and Coordination with Externalities Approach," Purdue University Economics Working Papers 1330, Purdue University, Department of Economics.
    4. Gürerk, Özgür & Irlenbusch, Bernd & Rockenbach, Bettina, 2017. "Endogenously Emerging Gender Diversity in an Experimental Team Work Setting," VfS Annual Conference 2017 (Vienna): Alternative Structures for Money and Banking 168067, Verein für Socialpolitik / German Economic Association.
    5. Özgür Gürerk & Bernd Irlenbusch & Bettina Rockenbach, 2018. "Endogenously Emerging Gender Pay Gap in an Experimental Teamwork Setting," Games, MDPI, vol. 9(4), pages 1-19, December.
    6. Kyung Hwan Baik & Subhasish M. Chowdhury & Abhijit Ramalingam, 2021. "Group size and matching protocol in contests," Canadian Journal of Economics/Revue canadienne d'économique, John Wiley & Sons, vol. 54(4), pages 1716-1736, November.
    7. Fischbacher, Urs & Kübler, Dorothea & Stüber, Robert, 2022. "Betting on diversity: Occupational segregation and gender stereotypes," Discussion Papers, Research Unit: Market Behavior SP II 2022-207, WZB Berlin Social Science Center.
    8. Embrey, Matthew & Seel, Christian & Philipp Reiss, J., 2024. "Gambling in risk-taking contests: Experimental evidence," Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, Elsevier, vol. 221(C), pages 570-585.
    9. Ciril Bosch-Rosa & Thomas Meissner & Antoni Bosch-Domènech, 2018. "Cognitive bubbles," Experimental Economics, Springer;Economic Science Association, vol. 21(1), pages 132-153, March.
    10. SeEun Jung & Radu Vranceanu, 2017. "Gender Interaction in Teams: Experimental Evidence on Performance and Punishment Behavior," Korean Economic Review, Korean Economic Association, vol. 33, pages 95-126.
    11. Buckert, Magdalena & Oechssler, Jörg & Schwieren, Christiane, 2017. "Imitation under stress," Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, Elsevier, vol. 139(C), pages 252-266.
    12. Koppel, Hannes & Regner, Tobias, 2019. "What drives motivated agents: The ‘right’ mission or sharing it with the principal?," Journal of Behavioral and Experimental Economics (formerly The Journal of Socio-Economics), Elsevier, vol. 83(C).
    13. Gill, David & Prowse, Victoria, 2019. "Measuring costly effort using the slider task," Journal of Behavioral and Experimental Finance, Elsevier, vol. 21(C), pages 1-9.
    14. Friehe, Tim & Utikal, Verena, 2018. "Intentions under cover – Hiding intentions is considered unfair," Journal of Behavioral and Experimental Economics (formerly The Journal of Socio-Economics), Elsevier, vol. 73(C), pages 11-21.
    15. Astrid Gamba & Elena Manzoni & Luca Stanca, 2017. "Social comparison and risk taking behavior," Theory and Decision, Springer, vol. 82(2), pages 221-248, February.
    16. Azmat, Ghazala & Petrongolo, Barbara, 2014. "Gender and the labor market: What have we learned from field and lab experiments?," Labour Economics, Elsevier, vol. 30(C), pages 32-40.
    17. Florian Hett & Felix Schmidt, 2018. "Pushing Through or Slacking Off? Heterogeneity on the Reaction to Rank Feedback," Working Papers 1806, Gutenberg School of Management and Economics, Johannes Gutenberg-Universität Mainz.
    18. Gaudeul, Alexia & Keser, Claudia, 2017. "The social preferences of democratically elected decision makers and the conflict between wealth generation and distribution," University of Göttingen Working Papers in Economics 327, University of Goettingen, Department of Economics.
    19. Grosch, Kerstin & Rau, Holger A., 2017. "Gender differences in honesty: The role of social value orientation," Journal of Economic Psychology, Elsevier, vol. 62(C), pages 258-267.
    20. Agnès Festré & Pierre Garrouste & Ankinée Kirakozian & Mira Toumi, 2017. "The Pen Might Be Mightier than the Sword: How Third-party Advice or Sanction Impacts on Pro-environmental Behavior," GREDEG Working Papers 2017-15, Groupe de REcherche en Droit, Economie, Gestion (GREDEG CNRS), Université Côte d'Azur, France, revised Aug 2017.

    More about this item

    Keywords

    Affirmative action; Group processes; Gender quota; Cooperation; Diversity; Gender equality;
    All these keywords.

    JEL classification:

    • C92 - Mathematical and Quantitative Methods - - Design of Experiments - - - Laboratory, Group Behavior
    • D23 - Microeconomics - - Production and Organizations - - - Organizational Behavior; Transaction Costs; Property Rights
    • J78 - Labor and Demographic Economics - - Labor Discrimination - - - Public Policy (including comparable worth)
    • M14 - Business Administration and Business Economics; Marketing; Accounting; Personnel Economics - - Business Administration - - - Corporate Culture; Diversity; Social Responsibility

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:eee:joepsy:v:57:y:2016:i:c:p:136-152. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Catherine Liu (email available below). General contact details of provider: http://www.elsevier.com/locate/joep .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.