To

Of particular interest iswhether a gender difference in tournament entry is explained bygeneral factors such as overconfidence, risk, and feedback aver-sion (Explanations 2– 4) or if part of such a difference is accountedfor by preference differences for performing in a competition(Explanation 1).

What distinguishes Explanation 1 from the otherthree is that it relies critically on the tournament-entry decisionresulting in a subsequent competitive performance

or example, Lunde-berg, Fox, and Puncochar [1994] argue that the reason why somestudies do not find gender differences in confidence on generalknowledge is because it is not in the masculine domain

In addition to suggesting that men hold a stronger preferencefor competition these evolutionary explanations are also used toexplain why men often are more confident in their relative per-formance and less averse to risk.

One argues that since men canhave many more children than women the potential gain inreproductive success from winning a competition is much greaterfor men, and men have therefore evolved to be more competitivethan women [Daly and Wilson 1983]. The second theory focuseson one gender being responsible for parental care. While a man’sdeath does not influence his current reproductive success, a wom-an’s death may cause the loss of her current offspring [Campbell2002]. Thus differences in potential losses as well as potentialgains from competition may make males more eager to compete.

Nurture as well as nature may cause women to be relativelymore reluctant to perform in a competition. First, we tend to raisegirls and boys differently

Prior research suggeststhat performance measures are particularly important in thisenvironment as men and women who perform similarly in non-competitive environments can differ in their performance whenthey have to compete against one another (see Gneezy, Niederle,and Rustichini [2003], Gneezy and Rustichini [2004], and Larson[2005])

Finally, controlling for gender differences in general factorssuch as overconfidence, risk, and feedback aversion, we estimatethe size of the residual gender differenc

also determine if, absent the thrill orfear of performing in a competition, a gender gap in choice ofcompensation scheme still occurs

Compared to payoff-max-imizing choices, low-ability men enter the tournament too much,and high-ability women do not enter it enough

factors suchas risk and feedback aversion only play a negligible role

solve a real task