Responsibility-Alleviation and Other-Regarding Preferences with Peer Workers in Labor Markets: An Experimental Investigation

Mark F. Owens

doi:10.1007/s12122-012-9138-9

Responsibility-Alleviation and Other-Regarding Preferences with Peer Workers in Labor Markets: An Experimental Investigation

Mark F. Owens

Black School of Business (Behrend)

Research output: Contribution to journal › Article › peer-review

4 Scopus citations

Abstract

A peer worker is introduced in a controlled labor market experiment characterized by unobservable effort and incomplete contracts. Workers make decisions independently and without knowledge of each other's actions in a modified gift exchange experiment. Introducing a peer worker into an ongoing market has a negative and significant effect on effort. This decrease in effort is consistent with responsibility-alleviation on the part of employees and not with other-regarding equity concerns for the manager's payoffs.

Original language	English (US)
Pages (from-to)	353-369
Number of pages	17
Journal	Journal of Labor Research
Volume	33
Issue number	3
DOIs	https://doi.org/10.1007/s12122-012-9138-9
State	Published - Sep 2012

All Science Journal Classification (ASJC) codes

Strategy and Management
Organizational Behavior and Human Resource Management
Management of Technology and Innovation

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10.1007/s12122-012-9138-9

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title = "Responsibility-Alleviation and Other-Regarding Preferences with Peer Workers in Labor Markets: An Experimental Investigation",

abstract = "A peer worker is introduced in a controlled labor market experiment characterized by unobservable effort and incomplete contracts. Workers make decisions independently and without knowledge of each other's actions in a modified gift exchange experiment. Introducing a peer worker into an ongoing market has a negative and significant effect on effort. This decrease in effort is consistent with responsibility-alleviation on the part of employees and not with other-regarding equity concerns for the manager's payoffs.",

author = "Owens, {Mark F.}",

note = "Funding Information: This research has been partially supported by a Faculty Research and Creative Projects Grant at Middle Tennessee State University and by the Department of Economics at Ohio State University. The author thanks John Kagel for his help and financial support, Adam Hogan for valuable research assistance and Susan Rose and J. Laron Kirby for their help in conducting experiments. All experimental materials, instructions and data are available upon request from the author at: mark.owens@mtsu.edu.",

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ER -

Responsibility-Alleviation and Other-Regarding Preferences with Peer Workers in Labor Markets: An Experimental Investigation

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