Introduction

Individuals have engaged in contests and competitions throughout history. Nowadays, interpersonal competitions are present in all life arenas, and may take different forms that are influenced by individuals and situational variables [1]. In fact, competitions are not only present, but also serve as a situational and potentially influential factor within central spheres of life, such as work and education [2]. Therefore, there is much interest in investigating the impacts of a preliminary contest on varied types of prosocial behaviors. The current work aims to explore the effect of participation in an earlier contest, beyond a specific outcome, on prosocial behavior in a subsequent, independent situation, expanding the body of research on contest impact. In addition, due to inconsistent findings regarding the effect of contest outcome on subsequent prosociality, we will reexamine this effect.

Competitive situations have psychological, physiological and behavioral influences [3, 4]. Among other findings, competitive environments were found to encourage unethical behavior in the lab, in the context of kickbacks [5], and out of the lab, in the form of tax avoidance [6]. In addition, within the interaction of a sequential 10-round dictator game, Duffy & Kornienko [7] found that ranking participants according to how high their allocations were relative to other dictators' allocations reduced generosity.

Prosocial behavior has been linked to empathy (e.g., [8–12]), which is an emotional response that focuses on others [13]. For instance, high empathy levels were found to induce increased altruistic behavior that was expressed by greater resource allocation to the target of the empathy [14, 15].

Engaging in competitive contests may be associated with reduced empathy. Zaki [16] used the illustration of a linebacker being unable to do his job well if he shares the pain of players he tackles as an example of the fact that empathy may interfere with performance in competition. Cikara, Bruneau, Van Bavel & Saxe [17] investigated the effect of competition on empathy and found that competition between groups reduced empathy and increased individuals’ counter-empathic responses toward out-group members. Along the same lines, Lanzetta & Englis [18] demonstrated that expectations of competition resulted in counter-empathetic physiological expressions.

Since competitive environments are associated with reduced empathy, which is in turn related to reduced prosociality, and in light of the presented evidence demonstrating reduced prosociality in the competitive interaction itself (e.g., [7, 19]), we hypothesize that participation in a competitive contest, beyond the contest outcome, will reduce prosociality in a subsequent, unrelated situation.

In addition to the hypothesized effect of participation in a contest on subsequent prosocial behavior, we are also interested in examining the effect of contest outcome–winning versus losing–on this behavior. Intuitively and theoretically, there are reasons to believe that winners will be more prosocial than losers, as well as reasons to predict that losers will be more prosocial than winners. On the one hand, and as mentioned by Kidd, Nicholas & Rai [20], according to the warm glow theory [21] winners are anticipated to be more prosocial because they are in a good mood in light of their recent win. On the other hand, Kidd et al. [20] also mentioned that according to the negative state-relief model [22] losers are predicted to be more prosocial as an attempt to improve their bad mood that was generated by the loss. These two possible and contradictory predictions are based on findings that winning or losing a contest accordingly evokes positive or negative emotions (e.g., [23, 24]), and that good feelings (e.g., [25]) as well as bad feelings (e.g., [26]) increase prosociality.

In addition to the theoretical basis for the hypotheses predicting higher prosociality for both contest winners and losers, the experimental findings from earlier works are inconclusive. In a work by Kidd et al. [20], individuals’ donations to charity were measured after a contest between four participants, and it was found that winners were more generous than the others. In contrast, in a work by Schurr & Ritov [27], winners tended to cheat more than losers did in order to maximize their monetary profit at the expense of other participants. However, there are two main differences between these two above-mentioned works. Whereas in the work by Kidd et al. [20] winners earned more money than the others did due to their victory, in the work by Schurr & Ritov [27] winners did not earn more money than losers, although they were rewarded with a pair of earbuds. Another difference, as previously mentioned, is the number of opponents in the contest. While in the Kidd et al. [20] experiment there were four participants in the contest, in the Schurr & Ritov [27] experiment there were two participants in each contest. I.e., each participant was either a winner or a loser. These two differences lead us to hypothesize that in a contest between two opponents, in which the prize for winning may not be used as a resource in a subsequent decision, winners will be less prosocial than losers.

This hypothesis is supported by two lines of research, one which suggests that winners are akin to high-status group members, and another that has linked high status to reduced prosocial behavior. The first line of research refers to winning or losing a contest as a respective upward or downward shift in status (e.g., [23, 28]), and therefore suggests that winning a contest may serve as a high-status marker [29]. The second line of research demonstrates that high-status individuals are less tolerant of resource distribution in which their portion is significantly smaller than the other party’s [30, 31]. Furthermore, high status is related to increased unethical behavior, such as approving unethical actions [32] or actually cheating in order to increase one’s chances to win a prize [33]. Finally, and highly relevant to our work, high status has been linked to reduced prosociality (as reviewed by Piff & Robinson [34]), such as in resource allocation decisions [35] and in helping behavior [36].

Based on the findings that high status is related to an increased sense of entitlement [37], and that entitlement is negatively related to several aspects of prosociality [38], the decreased prosociality of high-status members has been linked to increased entitlement [34]. In addition, it was found that equality priming eliminated entitlement differences between high and low-status members [37]. Therefore, it makes sense to assume that the salience of equality concerns would also diminish differences in prosociality between the two groups. Support for this reasoning is provided by a study demonstrating that dictators' allocation decisions were dependent on their family income and decision framing [39]. The researchers found that whereas high-income dictators allocated less to the other when the decision was framed in terms of giving, this difference was not found when the decision was framed in terms of dividing.

The similarity between winners and high-status members, and the finding of Schurr & Ritov [27] that winning a contest enhances a sense of entitlement, lead us to explore whether framing the task such that it evokes equality considerations would diminish, or even eliminate, the negative effect of winning a contest on prosociality in subsequent situations. Indeed, task framing may serve as a useful tool through which policy makers can affect decisions without investing further incentives (e.g. choice architecture [40, 41]; decisions framing, [39, 42–44]).

The current work

The current work is based on four experiments that each consisted of two main stages. The first stage was participation in a game, which was presented to participants in the treatment groups (i.e. winners and losers) as competitive, and to control group participants as having no competitive elements. The second stage consisted of making a decision that served as a measure of participant prosociality. For the sake of generality, we implemented two behavioral measurements of prosocial behavior–resource allocation and labor allocation.

In Experiment 1 we demonstrated the effect of taking part in a contest, and of contest outcome, on subsequent prosocial behavior measured through a resource allocation decision–a hypothetical dictator game. Experiments 2.1 and 2.2 were conducted in order to eliminate alternative explanations for the results obtained in Experiment 1. Experiment 3 replicated the findings of Experiment 1 using a real money dictator game as the dependent variable. In Experiment 4 we aimed to enable a broader generalization of our previous findings by using a labor allocation decision as the dependent variable. Additionally, in this final experiment we demonstrated the interaction effect between the outcome of a contest and the framing of the decision. [The data files can be found at https://osf.io/mxj76/?view_only=aced4d03ba1a46abac9c0375f55e44a6]

Experiment 1

Allocation of resources in a dictator game served as the current work’s first dependent variable. For Experiment 1 we used a hypothetical version of the dictator game and we hypothesized that: (H1) Participants who took part in a contest would allocate less money than participants who did not take part in a contest to their partner in the dictator game. (H2) Participants who won the contest would allocate less money than participants who lost the contest to their partner in the dictator game.

Experiment 2.1

In light of the procedure and results reported in Experiment 1, it could be argued that the possibility of winning a prize, rather than the engagement in a contest, led to the reduced prosociality observed in the subsequent interaction. Similarly, the reduced prosociality that we attributed to winning a contest could alternatively be attributed to winning a prize. In order to test these alternative explanations, we designed and conducted Experiment 2.1.

Experiment 2.1 included three groups: two groups that were equivalent to the treatment groups from Experiment 1, and a control group. Participants in the treatment groups had a chance to win participation in a raffle for a $5 Amazon Gift Card without engaging in a contest, while participants in the control group did not have that chance. If the effects in Experiment 1 indeed stemmed from the chance to participate in a raffle, then this experiment should yield equivalent results. I.e., we would expect to find a significant difference between participants who had the chance to win raffle participation (treatment groups) and participants who did not (control group). In addition, a significant difference would be expected between participants who won the raffle participation ("random winners") and participants who had the chance to win but did not ("random losers"). In contrast, if this experiment does not yield significant results, it would eliminate the alternative explanations and would therefore support our conclusion regarding the effect of preliminary contest and its outcome on subsequent prosocial behavior.

Experiment 2.2

Another alternative explanation for the negative effect of winning a contest on prosociality may be related to anticipated emotions. Specifically, it could be argued that participation in a future raffle, which was the prize of winning the contest, led the contest winner to envision a possibility in which they may not win the raffle and would therefore be left with no tangible prize at all. This insight may create negative feelings such as disappointment or frustration, which may in turn lead to reduced prosociality.

In order to test this alternative explanation, Experiment 2.2 directly probes the anticipated emotions of winners pertaining to the raffle outcomes. As in Experiment 1, participants engaged in a contest in which winners won participation in a raffle for a $5 Amazon Gift Card. If the reduced prosociality of winners in Experiment 1 was a result of anticipated disappointment due to the possibility of not winning the future raffle, it would be expected that when winners think of their winning and of the possible outcomes of the future raffle, it would evoke negative emotions. In contrast, if winners report overall high positive emotion, we can conclude that although they have not obtained the outcome of the raffle, the anticipated participation in the raffle evokes positive emotions, and this would not support the role of anticipated disappointment as the source of the effect.

Experiment 3

The present experiment sought to replicate the findings of the effect of contest and its outcome on prosocial behavior from Experiment 1. This replication is important because, as mentioned in the introduction, there were theoretical and empirical findings that would have predicted the opposite results of those observed in Experiment 1. In addition to the replication itself, this experiment aims to examine whether the effects found in Experiment 1 would replicate when decisions have real monetary consequences.

According to the findings from Experiment 1 and the reviewed literature, we hypothesized that: (H1) Participants who took part in a contest would allocate less money in the dictator game, compared to participants who did not take part in a contest. (H2) Winners would allocate less than losers in the dictator game.

Experiment 4

After finding and replicating the effect of a preliminary contest and its outcome on prosociality, measured by subsequent resource allocation decisions, we wanted to examine whether the negative effect of winning a contest on subsequent prosociality would replicate in another aspect of prosocial behavior that is highly relevant for organizational and managerial contexts–labor allocation. In addition, we wanted to explore the robustness of the negative effect of contest outcome when the decision is presented in a variety of ways.

In light of the previously mentioned finding, according to which equality priming may diminish differences between high- and low-status members [37], we wanted to explore whether such priming would eliminate the negative effect of winning a contest on prosociality. In order to do that, we added another independent variable: the framing of the decision. In one condition the decision was framed as a 'dividing' decision, and in the other condition the decision was framed as a 'giving' decision. Intuitively, and as research suggests [39], we expected equality concerns to be raised as a result of the 'dividing' framing.

Thus, in addition to our hypothesis that in the giving framing winners would allocate more labor to others compared to losers, we wanted to test whether the difference between the two groups would disappear in the dividing framing.

Results

The competition check.

The competition check questions, to which participants in the treatment groups responded, showed that they wanted to win the game (M = 7.44, SD = 2.28), believed that the game reflected more ability than luck (M = 7.78, SD = 2.26), and that they wanted not to lose the game (M = 3.02, SD = 2.9). The significant negative correlation between the willingness to win and the desire not to lose (r = -0.44, p < 0.001), indicates that participants did not respond randomly to these questions.

Labor allocation decisions.

The mean number of questions that the participants from each of the groups chose to answer by themselves is displayed in Fig 1.

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Fig 1. Mean number of questions that participants answer by themselves as dependent on treatment group.

Error bars represent one standard error.

https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0240712.g001

A two-way ANOVA demonstrated no significant effect of contest outcome F(1,436) = 0.37, p = .54, Partial η2 = 0.001, a nearly significant effect of framing F(1,436) = 3.34, p = .07, Partial η2 = 0.008, and a significant interaction effect F(1,436) = 5.24, p = .02, Partial η2 = 0.012. These analyses indicate that winners did not answer a significantly different number of questions than the losers, and that participants in the giving framing answered nearly significantly fewer questions than participants in the dividing framing. In addition, the analyses indicate that the difference between winners and losers varied depending on the framing. Follow up t-test analyses for each framing separately showed that whereas there was no significant difference between the number of questions that winners (M = 3.86, SD = 2.83) and losers (M = 3.41, SD = 2.57) answered in the dividing framing, t(217) = 1.22, p = .22), this was not the case in the giving framing. In the giving framing, winners (M = 2.77, SD = 2.86) answered significantly fewer questions than losers (M = 3.54, SD = 2.87), t(219) = -2, p = .047, Cohen's d = 0.27.

General discussion

The current work makes two major contributions to the large body of research on contests, and particularly to the growing line of research that investigates influences of preliminary contests and their outcomes on subsequent decision-making (e.g., [19, 20, 27, 46]). The first contribution is the presentation of the robust effect of contest participation on prosocial behavior in subsequent situations. The second contribution is the finding that the effect of winning a contest on prosociality is frame-dependent. I.e., winning a contest harms prosociality only when the decision is framed as a “giving” decision, but not when it is framed as a “dividing” decision.

The effect of contest participation on subsequent prosociality suggests that the effect found by Duffy & Kornienko [7], according to which generosity is reduced due to a competitive interaction, is not limited to the specific interaction involving the contest, but may spill over to other situations. Notably, this effect may be related to rivalry formation [47] and to the link between rivalry and unethical behavior [48, 49].

Interestingly, our results are also in line with the findings by Peysakhovich & Rand [50], according to which competitive strategies that were adopted during a preliminary interaction due to its environmental structure were carried over and were expressed later through less prosocial decisions. The authors [50] explained their results in light of the social heuristics hypothesis [51]. Specifically, they suggested that the early interactions, wherein competitive strategies were dominant, made a less prosocial decision the intuitive behavior in the later interaction. Note that although the social heuristics hypothesis was initially presented in the context of cooperation, it was later demonstrated in the context of altruism [52] and was also formalized in a general model [53]. In fact, our findings that preliminary contest harms prosociality could be interpreted along the same lines. I.e., competitive behavior becomes the default behavior during the contest stage, and this competitive strategy then spills over to the subsequent decision situation, although there is no reason to connect the two independent situations.

The frame-dependent effect of winning suggests that winners are predicted to be less prosocial than losers in decisions that involve giving of oneself to benefit others. In addition, this effect may suggest that the influence of contest outcome interacts with other factors present in the decision-making environment. Specifically, we showed that the effect of contest outcome on prosociality depended on the perceived role of the decision maker–as a potential giver vs. divider. More broadly, and based on the literature that linked contest outcomes to perceived status (e.g., [23, 28, 29]), this finding hints that the effect of social status on prosocial behavior may depend on the way the decision makers’ perceive their role. Finding that the negative effect on prosociality holds only in a giving framing and not in a dividing framing is important not only from a theoretical perspective, but also because it may help enhance desirable behavior and inhibit undesirable behavior.

Referring to the earlier discussed discrepancy between findings by Kidd et al. [20] and Schurr & Ritov [27] regarding the effect of winning on subsequent prosocial decisions, our findings are in line with the results of Schurr & Ritov [27]. The contradictory results found by Kidd et al. [20], that winners donated to charity more than the other competitors, may be explained by the fact that their winners had earned more money than the others–due to their victory–and were then asked to decide how much of their earnings to donate. In other words, not only was the preliminary contest connected to the donation decision by the fact that the participants’ initial endowments were determined by their contest’s outcome, but the decision instructions also explicitly mentioned that the donations would come from the participant’s earnings. In this context, it is important to mention that although Kidd et al. [20] controlled for the absolute earning between winners and losers, they did not control for the relative earning of winners in comparison to the other competitors. Hence, this design did not completely isolate the preliminary contest from the subsequent donation decision. Specifically, the effect of winning a contest was not disentangled from the effect of receiving a higher reward than others. According to the social comparison literature, receiving a higher (lower) reward than others places the individual in a situation of downward (upward) social comparison. Therefore, research showing that upward social comparison inhibits prosocial behavior (e.g., [54]) while downward social comparison enhances prosocial behavior (e.g., [55, 56]) may explain the results obtained by Kidd et al. [20].

In fact, the different results obtained by Kidd et al. [20] and Schurr & Ritov [27], together with our finding regarding the interaction between contest outcome and perceived role, demonstrate the complexity of contest outcome’s effect on prosocial behavior. I.e., the effect of contest outcome on prosociality may be particularly context-sensitive, in more than one sense. Specifically, in addition to contest characteristics and prize methods, the effect of contest outcome on prosociality is mediated and/or moderated by emotions and thoughts evoked by the preliminary contest and perhaps related to the contest design. Interestingly, interpersonal differences may also act as mediators and moderators. Thus, future work could focus on additional characteristics of the decision-task or the contest environment, which may interact with the effect of contest outcome on prosocial behavior, and on other types of behaviors. In addition, further research may focus more on the possible interpersonal differences with regard to the relevant effects.

The current work also has organizational and managerial implications. For example, in regards to organizational methods that aim to increase employees' productivity, our findings suggest that negative side effects should be considered. First, the extent to which such methods are employed should be monitored. Second, actions should be taken in order to prevent subsequent antisocial behavior after social comparisons. In this context, relevant field experiments may be extremely useful.

Supporting information