Behavioral spillovers from freeriding in multilevel interactions

Kirsten Thommes, Jana Vyrastekova and Agnes Akkerman

Journal of Behavioral and Experimental Economics (formerly The Journal of Socio-Economics), 2015, vol. 56, issue C, 78-87

Abstract: We study multilevel interactions using experimental methods. Does the efficiency of a production team suffer from the freeriding behavior of some team members at the firm level? Can we identify behavioral spillovers affecting teams? We isolate common tasks that teams must complete – coordination and cooperation – and model each of them using a simple experimental game that is designed to avoid identification problems. By observing a team's efficiency before and after the firm-level event, we identify the behavioral spillovers of freeriding to team-level cooperation and coordination. We demonstrate that team composition with respect to freeriding behavior of individual members during the firm-level conflict conditions behavioral spillovers. In particular, the efficiency of heterogeneous teams decreases after a firm-level conflict, whereas homogeneous teams can improve their performance.

Keywords: Collective conflict; Cooperation; Coordination; Teamwork (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: C71 J52 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2015
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Citations: View citations in EconPapers (1)

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Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:eee:soceco:v:56:y:2015:i:c:p:78-87

DOI: 10.1016/j.socec.2015.03.006

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