 The desire to win: The effects of competitive arousal on motivation and behaviorDeepak Malhotra Organizational Behavior and Human Decision Processes, 2010, vol. 111, issue 2, 139-146 Abstract: The paper theoretically elaborates and empirically investigates the "competitive arousal" model of decision making, which argues that elements of the strategic environment (e.g., head-to-head rivalry and time pressure) can fuel competitive motivations and behavior. Study 1 measures real-time motivations of online auction bidders and finds that the "desire to win" (even when winning is costly and will provide no strategic upside) is heightened when rivalry and time pressure coincide. Study 2 is a field experiment which alters the text of email alerts sent to bidders who have been outbid; the text makes competitive (vs. non-competitive) motivations salient. Making the desire to win salient triggers additional bidding, but only when rivalry and time pressure coincide. Study 3, a laboratory study, demonstrates that the desire to win mediates the effect of rivalry and time pressure on over-bidding. Keywords: Competitive; arousal; Desire; to; win; Competitive; motivation; Rivalry; Time; pressure; Escalation; Auction; Bidding; Competition; Winning; Relative; payoffs; Conflict; Negotiation; Dispute (search for similar items in EconPapers) Downloads: (external link) Related works: Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:eee:jobhdp:v:111:y:2010:i:2:p:139-146 Access Statistics for this article Organizational Behavior and Human Decision Processes is currently edited by John M. Schaubroeck More articles in Organizational Behavior and Human Decision Processes from Elsevier |
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