Striving for your Own Good: The Impact of Effort in Anticommons Dilemmas

The present study investigates how the exertion of effort will impact behavior in an anticommons resource dilemma. Anticommons dilemmas arise when limitations in access lead to underuse. A paradigm was developed in which two participants shared a common resource of 100 points. Using the resource was only possible if both parties reached an agreement. In the experiment, participants were asked to indicate how many points they would like to receive (WTA values) to grant the other party access to the resource. Likewise, they were asked how many points they would like to spend (WTP values) to get access themselves. Before the indication of WTA and WTP, half of the participants needed to complete a slider task to simulate an effortful task to gain co-ownership of the resource. 237 UK participants were recruited and put in dyads to partake in the online experiment. Results revealed that social value orientation (SVO) strongly impacted the behavior and outcome of anticommons dilemmas. SVO...Show moreThe present study investigates how the exertion of effort will impact behavior in an anticommons resource dilemma. Anticommons dilemmas arise when limitations in access lead to underuse. A paradigm was developed in which two participants shared a common resource of 100 points. Using the resource was only possible if both parties reached an agreement. In the experiment, participants were asked to indicate how many points they would like to receive (WTA values) to grant the other party access to the resource. Likewise, they were asked how many points they would like to spend (WTP values) to get access themselves. Before the indication of WTA and WTP, half of the participants needed to complete a slider task to simulate an effortful task to gain co-ownership of the resource. 237 UK participants were recruited and put in dyads to partake in the online experiment. Results revealed that social value orientation (SVO) strongly impacted the behavior and outcome of anticommons dilemmas. SVO was negatively correlated to WTA values, which suggests that a higher score on SVO (indicating higher prosociality) led to higher willingness to grant the other party access to the resource. Moreover, a positive effect of psychological ownership on WTP values was found. Lastly, it was found that effort did have a significant effect on WTA values in anticommons dilemmas. Participants who were exposed to an effortful task prior to the bargaining game were setting higher WTA values than those who were not.Show less

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Striving for your Own Good: The Impact of Effort in Anticommons Dilemmas