Excess of commitment and gender differences: the role of competition and signals

Nicolas Jalabert ()
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Nicolas Jalabert: CMW - Centre Max Weber - ENS de Lyon - École normale supérieure de Lyon - Université de Lyon - UL2 - Université Lumière - Lyon 2 - UJM - Université Jean Monnet - Saint-Étienne - UJM EPE - Université Jean Monnet (EPSCPE) - CNRS - Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique, ENS de Lyon - École normale supérieure de Lyon - Université de Lyon, BETA - Bureau d'Économie Théorique et Appliquée - AgroParisTech - UNISTRA - Université de Strasbourg - Université de Haute-Alsace (UHA) - Université de Haute-Alsace (UHA) Mulhouse - Colmar - UL - Université de Lorraine - CNRS - Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique - INRAE - Institut National de Recherche pour l’Agriculture, l’Alimentation et l’Environnement

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Abstract: The study aimed to connect both literature on over-commitment and gender differences by testing how these two may be related and whether women and men are as likely to experience excessive commitment in a situation specifically designed to elicit it. We tested three different treatments regarding competition and uncertainty. Treatments were randomly assigned at the session level in a between-subject design. In our experiment participants had to choose between two effort tasks, including one stereotypically more associated with men, the one they prefer to continue the experiment which consist of fifteen sessions of the task. Results showed that men are more likely to choose the stereotypically male associated task (math) which is mainly explained by different preferences. Within this context, women tend to over-commit less than men in this same task. This difference remains after controlling for task preference, risk, and performance but only for two out of the three treatments (except under uncertainty).

Keywords: Competition; Commitment trajectories; Gender Bias; Experimental Eco- nomics (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2026-07-14
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Published in ESA World 2026 (Economic Science Association), Economic Science Association; Loyola Marymount University; University of California San Diego, Jul 2026, Los Angeles, California, United States

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Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:hal:journl:hal-05752171

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